Permaculture in Havana

The City can Save the World *

by Sarah Wright and Toni Phillips **

* -- The Charter of Calcutta implores "We must cease seeing the city as a problem. We must see it as a solution"
** - Sarah and Toni have just returned to Australia after working for a year on the ACF Food Gardener Education Project in Cuba (See http://peg.apc.org/~adamt/cuba/aboutpr.htm).

Walk along any street in Havana and you will see greenery; grape vines hang from walls, yuca (cassava) and boniato (sweet potato) are grown on verges and small gardens are popping up everywhere. Urban gardening started as a response to economic hardships after the collapse of the soviet bloc. Cubans were looking for new ways to feed themselves. Now Havana's network of urban gardens is drawing the eyes of the world. Urban food gardens represent a city taking steps to make itself self-sufficient and sustainable

As the twentieth century draws to a close the world is facing more and more environmental challenges.

One important element that provides a common thread for all these issues is the city. Cities suck into themselves food, energy, water and materials often form the other side of the planet, they produce very little of their baisc needs for themselves. Our cities are resource sinks. Solving consumption problems of the city would make a major contribution to solving major environmental and social problems.

Havana has 20,000 small gardens with over 70 extension workers that offer advice and some material assistance to the gardeners. There are also eight seed houses that distribute the necessary seed. The government has made parcels of land available to people who request it for gardening. Food is grown near to where it is consumed cutting down on transportation and fuel consumption, refrigeration, storage and packaging, and the associated pollution. The fact that it is diversive garden and people entred means that problems of pesticide use or chemical fertilisers are reduced.

Lilia Díaz Machado, or "Tata", a 70 year old gardener from Cerro who has been gardening for 30 years not only feeds her extended family from her plot of land that lies at the back of the house but also manages to produce surplus for childcare centres. She grows a wide range of crops like corn, cassava, paw paw, calabazas (pumpkin and squash), medicinal plants (oregano, parsley, Guava, coco, mint, cilantro, verbena), sweet potato, taro, and ají (capsicum) in rotation to help maintain soil fertility. Tata comes from a campesino (peasant) family and says "I am really happy with my life. I am old and the only thing I wish is that I could live for another 30 years to keep on gardening".

One of the key factors of the program is the network of clubs that exist throughout the city. The clubs provide a way to distribute information and goods to the gardeners. Ricardo Sierra started gardening to help with food production in the special period and is now part of the 'Plaza' horticultural club with 30 other gardeners. With the tower of the Plaza of the Revolution in background Sierra, with the help of 6 co-workers, has built up a productive space on an old building and dump site. Their first task was to remove the stones and rubble and build up the soil. The garden now produces avocado, cabbage, sweet potato, cassava, pawpaw, guanabana, grapes, cucumbers, carrots, lettuce, pumpkin, capsicums, peanuts, onions, banana, rabbits, pigs, chickens and ducks. His design for his garden won a recent Permaculture design competition.

The bottom line is that the greening of Havana, albeit taken in a situation of urgency, is a model for the rest of the world. Nowhere else are people working in such a way to improve their living standards and in doing so, improving the sustainability of the whole city. This is permaculture in practice.

Havana is a model for food security for city people of the world. it does this within a culture of low consumption.

(An edited version of the above article appeared in ACF Habitat magazine in June 1996, with photos, and can be found on the Web at http://www.peg.apc.org/~adamt/cuba/hab9606/hab9606.htm )