ESC: Natural gardening and nature restoration

The project aims to activate young adults from all over Europe for permaculture, sustainable food production in agriculture and nature conservation. The principles of PaLS are based on sociocratic values that have formed a living community since thirty years in the village of Flecken Steyerberg. This community focuses on sustainable living and health concepts, permaculture, community building and antidiscrimination. Thus the European Voluntary Service ESC as a program to support youth and young adults offers an opportunity for exchanging intercultural experiences and accessibility to permaculture for a wider public. In this project, participants can build on their existing personal skills as well as develop new green skills and practice-oriented knowledge in bio-dynamic agriculture on their own initiative. The Steyerberg Permaculture Park is the oldest permaculture project in Germany. In the early 1980s the “Lebensgarten” community was founded near the centre of Steyerberg, in the so called “Flecken Steyerberg”. The permaculture park origin goes back to the foundation of this community. On the ground and in the buildings of the “Flecken Steyerberg” were once a former weapons factory during the Second World War and a forced labour camp. Thus a community of people settled once again, living a spiritual-ecological lifestyle according to sociocratic values. Co-founders and co-inhabitants of the “Lebensgarten” are Professors Margrit and Declan Kennedy. Margrit Kennedy became known worldwide through her scientific publications on alternative monetary systems and complementary currencies. Declan Kennedy was Director of the Permaculture Institute of Europe, when he came to Steyerberg in 1989. He also was Coordinator of the Ecoteam Programme for the Global Action Plan (GAP) for the Earth from 1989 to 1994 and Head of the European Secretariat and Chair of the Global Ecovillage Network for Europe until 1999. He brought his expertise to the research and demonstration project in Steyerberg to develop modern ecological cultivation techniques as well as sustainable energy production. For example, the first electric charging point for e-cars in North-Germany was installed in 1991. In this context, the town's wartime history was given a new lease of life through innovation, but also through commemorative work. As a result Steyerberg has become the smallest municipality in Germany to be included in the national Climate Protection Plan 2050 and to be awarded the title of sustainable municipality. It is also one of the 41 Masterplan municipalities that are promoted as climate protection role models by the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety. As an initiative of Declan Kennedy the ground of the permaculture park was first cultivated in 2003. The Permaculture Park in Steyerberg (PaLS) was founded in 2009, has been a non-profit limited liability company since 2013 and solidarity-based agriculture as PaLS gGmbH since 2020. The original intention of the permaculture park was to work experimentally with permacultural cultivation methods, education on the subject of permaculture as well as nature conservation and plant cultivation. However, in the context of global ecological crises, permaculture is increasingly emerging as an efficient solution for the sustainable production of food. That is why the original intention developed to the following guiding themes: - Dissemination of permacultural cultivation methods and modes of action as a (partial) solution to the climate crisis in theory and practice. - Demonstrating the ecological, economic and social viability of permaculture - Providing educational content in relation to the holistic transformation of the human-nature relationship - Promotion of nature conservation, landscape management and plant cultivation - Promoting the relationship between urban and rural areas