Perma journal is an open access publication and aims to publish content explicitly related to permaculture in its various aspects. We understand permaculture as "a systemic and socio-environmental science, joining scientific knowledge with traditional popular knowledge for designing permanent human environments in dynamic balance with nature". In this way, the journal seeks to encourage dissemination, production and discussion around permaculture. Perma journal is receiving manuscripts in a continuous flow! Submit your work today. Following the 3rd ethic of permaculture, all content is freely accessible and there are no processing fees or charges (No APC). We consider a cooperative logic in the construction of knowledge and opt for an open and collaborative evaluation process, where authors, evaluators and editors interact directly without anonymity. Help us to popularize Permaculture!
All content is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution-No Derivatives-No Derivatives. Creative commons - Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0).
Permaculture as a strategy for the recovery and resurgences of human and non-human landscapes in the age of climate mutations
In this historiographical dialogue, I present the context, developments and propositions aiming to explain the emergence of Permaculture. I highlight the processes that constituted it as ecological design, including theories, technologies, systems, forms of communication, to regenerate human and non-human degraded landscapes. The 1970s is the backdrop for the first compass to guide us in this scenario marked by counterculture and environmental movements; new theories, epistemic, approaches and ontologies, political issues of class, race, gender, environment, sexuality, etc. The second compass explains how the foundations of Bill Mollison's idea were formed, based on the recovery of epistemological and ontological information from people, science and diverse institutions, with confluence of disciplines and knowledge. The third compass brings the forms and forces of permaculture, based on ethics and principles, until we arrive at the reflection of how much we need new compasses, in the context of mutations. Finally, in the fourth compass, the objective is to confirm the importance of permaculture as a “tool” for sociobiocultural transformation, an educational strategy to educate prosperous and regenerated communities and reveal how updates reinvents itself considering the New Climatic Regime.
Copyright (c) 2025 Francisca Pereira dos Santos https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
A podcast on permaculture to promote public energy efficiency policies
In times of high energy consumption, measures like planning and energy efficiency are vital. Permaculture can contribute by efficiently designing rural or urban spaces, combining sustainability and energy efficiency through its integrated approach. In this context, public policies such as the National Energy Efficiency Plan suggest education and scientific divulgation as strategies to promote energy efficiency. Podcasts are a popular scientific divulgation tool. This article documents the creation of Fótons e Folhas, a podcast developed during a master’s study to link energy efficiency and permaculture, aiming to assist energy efficiency policy implementation. Production followed three phases: planning/structuring, scriptwriting, and recording/editing. The literature review identified no studies exploring how permaculture can contribute to such policies, highlighting a gap in knowledge. The first three episodes of the podcast (of thirteen planned) address: “Do you know what energy efficiency, public policies, and permaculture are?”, “What does ‘observe and interact’ mean?” and “What does ‘capture and store energy’ mean?”. The study concludes that a permaculture podcast can contribute to the implementation of energy efficiency policies.
Copyright (c) 2025 Patricia Abade Ferreira, Kátia Cilene Rodrigues Madruga, Mônica Knöpker https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Water and permaculture in Viktor Schauberger’s vision
This article revisits The Water Wizard by Austrian naturalist Viktor Schauberger and discusses his reflections on water, which anticipated contemporary principles of ecology and permaculture. His observations describe water not merely as a chemical substance, but as a living system endowed with “soul” and “character.” By relating his theories to scientific findings on the molecular structure of water, conductivity, and resonance, he highlights the water’s highest vitality in its natural river flow, its vortex motion, and its temperature gradients.
Copyright (c) 2025 Felipe Figueira https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Interfaces entre Permacultura, Promoção da Saúde e Saúde Planetária no contexto da Saúde Coletiva
Permaculture, Health Promotion, and Planetary Health converge on principles that seek to align human needs with the limits of ecosystems, promote healthy environments, and strengthen the autonomy of populations in building healthier lives, in conjunction with the sustainability of territories. This text aims to reflect on the interfaces between Permaculture, Health Promotion, and Planetary Health in the field of collective health. In view of the local and global challenges of the 21st century — especially those related to climate emergencies and the impacts on living conditions — it is essential to mobilize theoretical and practical references that contribute to the construction of sustainable, resilient, and health-promoting territories. Thus, it is expected to collaborate with the academic and technical debate, considering Permaculture as a field of knowledge, practice and innovation for the strengthening of collective health.
Copyright (c) 2025 Maria Francisca Santos Daussy, Antônio Augusto Alves Pereira , Luiz Henrique Chad Pellon, Mayara Floss https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
TERRA - a permaculture approach for rural solid waste
This permaculture note brings an approach to the management of rural solid waste. It is proposed to use the word TERRA (Earth in Portuguese) to guide about their management, where each of its letters indicates actions that involve its transformation, its destiny, refusal and rethink, recycle and reuse. A semaphore beacon into figures, where green brings the importance of thinking waste as resources, and that it is important to keep in mind to try to reuse them locally. Yellow sign, on the other hand, brings us the needed to rethink the consumption of raw materials that will have to be recycled or transformed externally to the community scale. Finally, red sign puts us the need to refuse/rethink the consumption of "goods" whose their cycle of reintegration is too long and involves pollution and high energy consumption.
Permaculture notes [only for Portuguese texts]
Copyright (c) 2025 Arthur Nanni, Marcelo Venturi, Cassandra Pulceno, Krieger Leopoldo https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Permaculture in public School: an experience in Ecoformation
The research sought pragmatic and methodological congruences between Permaculture and Ecoformation. The objective was to identify factors in the school that promote Permaculture projects combined with Ecoformation, and awaken an education from life and for life. The research took place at the Escola Reunida Professora Targina Boaventura da Costa, in Paulo Lopes, located on the edge of important environmental protection areas in Santa Catarina and was based on the experience of educators and students involving creativity, collaboration, resilience, the experience of interconnection and the notion of interdependence. The proposal provided an opportunity to raise awareness and transform people and spaces.
Copyright (c) 2025 Marjorie Vasques, Jeane Pukall https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Grounding in Permaculture for other possible worlds in the Anthropocene Age
This article aims to present an interpretation of Permaculture from the perspective of critical studies within the ontological turn in Anthropology and Philosophy of Science, in the Anthropocene Age. This article is based on the hypothesis of political fiction presented by Bruno Latour and the assertion of a New Climatic Regime that has evolved from an "environmental crisis" context, characteristic of the late 20th century, to one of "mutations" in the Contemporary Age. Despite overwhelming evidence and data on global warming and its consequences, this reality has been systematically denied by a neoliberal elite —since the 80s— leading to an international climate denialist movement, among other challenges. It is within this context —of the shift from "crisis" to "mutations" occurring in the social, political, and biospheric dimensions of the Earth —that Permaculture emerges as a significant "idea to postpone the end of the world," as expressed by Ailton Krenak, or as a form of resistance to the "Great Turning" according to Macy and Johnstone - demanding that we must take action and update our ways of thinking, acting, and composing in this new context of catastrophes and ruins.
Copyright (c) 2024 Francisca Pereira dos Santos https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Peripheral permaculture: counter-colonial and feminist reflections for a necessary debate
The article discusses the need for a peripheral, Counter-Colonial, and feminist permaculture approach in Brazil that values ancestral knowledge and marginalized perspectives in the protagonism of knowledge construction, in semiotics, and promotes socioeconomic and environmental justice. Hegemonic permaculture has often neglected the presence, in the body, in the coexistence, and in the language of individuals who produce ancestral knowledge, which peripheral, decolonial, and feminist permaculture seeks to overcome by proposing a more inclusive and contextualized approach. There are projects linked to popular public policies in peripheral communities, integrating various actors, that value the global and systemic context and move in this direction. Some concrete experiences of this approach are represented in the actions of the Permaculture Institute of Bahia.
Copyright (c) 2024 Luciana Neves Sarno https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Permaculture for food security and sovereignty
This article is a translation of the original text written in English by David Holmgren. An abridged version of this same text was first published in PIP Magazine: Australian Permaculture in March 2014. The author articulates several concepts, actions and consequences that have impacted food security and sovereignty, as well as pointing to permaculture as an important system of principles for the efficient organization of contemporary eating. While on the one hand the industrial food system results in a linear logic in which the production, processing, distribution and consumption of food produces material and energy waste at all stages, the food system based on permaculture principles promotes cycles in which thrive the biodiversity, resilience to adversities, access to organic food and empowerment of choosing what to plant, collect and eat.
Translations and digests [only for Portuguese texts]
Copyright (c) 2024 Yasmin El Kadri Monteiro (Tradutor) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Growing agroecology and permaculture at the university: harvest against coloniality thinking and sustainability
Agroecology and permaculture are recognized as systemic sciences, sets of techniques, and convergent socio- environmental movements. Both, grounded in modern scientifi c epistemologies as well as Afro-indigenous and popular perspectives, aim to foster greater autonomy and sustainability for localities and communities organized according to their principles. Through an account of the experience of germination and development of Sete Cascas - Permaculture Center at the State University of Southwest Bahia (UESB), we refl ect onthe role of these sciences as bridges in the construction of diverse and anti-colonial knowledge about sustainability within the context of university teaching, research, and extension.
Copyright (c) 1970 Letícia Magalhães Fernandes https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
The Clara Noite de Sol small farm: structuring a family and productive unit based on the principles of permaculture
Florianópolis, capital of the state of Santa Catarina, is a coastal tourist city located in southern Brazil. Ratones is one of its districts that still maintains agricultural activities and the rural way of living. With the advancement of urbanization, the rural mixed with the urban in Ratones, and the remaining agricultural activities were combined with tourist services. The objective of this experience report is to describe the conception of the family and productive unit Chácara Clara Noite de Sol, based on the 12 principles of permaculture, from which we sought to make economic activity viable through the production of mushrooms and environmental education, prioritizing autonomy and quality of life.
Copyright (c) 2024 Juliana Justo Conceição; Antonio Augusto Alves Pereira (Autor) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Autonomous house: permacultural practices to live in a sustainable house in urban centers
Following the global trend, the Brazilian population is mostly urban and is increasingly suffering from the impacts of climate change. This work proposes, through action research, to report experiences of sustainable housing in São Paulo, which seeks to promote autonomy for its inhabitants through permacultural practices. The action-research was conducted based on interventions, follow-up and systematization of actions at Casa do Chapéu de Sol (current headquarters of the Permacultores Urbanos network, in the city of São Paulo) in the following fields of interaction: i) solid waste management; ii) water autonomy and iii) food autonomy . In the process of systematizing the information, we sought to: i) present the relevant theoretical framework, contextualizing each thematic axis; ii) present practices, construction processes carried out or projects developed; iii) present the results from lessons learned and challenges. Different composting methods were put into practice, rainwater harvesting and appropriate sewage treatment for non-potable reuse, food production through aquaponics and hydroponics and responsible management of energy resources. Experience has proven that there are many practices that can bring sustainability to the day-to-day life of the São Paulo and urban population, whether carried out individually or collectively.
Gustavo Carvalhaes Xavier Martins Pontual Machado
Copyright (c) 2023 Vinicius Pereira de Souza, Machado Gustavo Carvalhaes Xavier Martins Pontual https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Using a teaching methodology in permaculture as a reference for the structuring of a systemic curriculum for Subsequent Technical Courses in Agroecology
Essa nota técnica apresenta uma proposta de [re]estruturação curricular para cursos de formação de técnicos subsequentes em Agroecologia, ofertados em Institutos Federais Brasileiros, baseada em elementos sistêmicos de ensino-aprendizagem utilizados no ensino de Permacultura.
Copyright (c) 2023 Karla Fünfgelt, Arthur Nanni https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
The First São Paulo’s Public Agroforestry
This text reports the experience of an Agroforestry Workshop taught in 2015 by the author in the iconic Vila Itororó in São Paulo (Brazil). The workshop was included in the Project “Vila Itororó – Canteiro Aberto”, and resulted in the implementation of the first São Paulo’s Public Agroforestry. The experience was part of a complex, unprecedented socialcultural experiment in the city, which aimed to question the destination and use of urban public spaces, providing the population with the possibility to intervene and propose new uses for the future Cultural Center, parallel with the progress of the final architectural and restoration projects.
Copyright (c) 2023 Gilberto Machel Veiga D'Angelis https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
In 1986, in the United States of America, the 2nd International Conference on Permaculture took place, which provided an extraordinary meeting between some of the most fruitful thinkers of the global movement for regenerative agriculture. On that occasion, a conversation was recorded between: Masanobu Fukuoka (1913-2008), Japanese elder, microbiologist, practitioner of wild agriculture; Wes Jackson (1936), American cowboy, geneticist with his perennial agriculture; and Bill Mollison (1928-2016), rebellious Australian gardener, biogeographer, co-creator of Permaculture. The manuscript portrays the historic meeting, and presents an unusual interview between these important farmers - researchers, who are fundamental in the process of epistemological rupture under a science with holistic basis.
Copyright (c) 1970 perma perma https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Evaluating ecological well-being on permaculture sites: a case study across Australia
In an urbanised world, people have been distanced from nature, generating a lot of environmental and social issues, leading to health and economic problems as a consequence. In the opposite way, some people are looking for other perspectives to live close to nature, looking for a better quality of life, and this new lifestyle has not been evaluated by common sense based on economic standards. Ecological well-being as a goal sits where people are part of nature and not something strange to our mother Earth. This paper presents the application of the Permaculture MESMIS methodology used to evaluate the ecological well-being to four groups of practitioners permaculturists across Australia, including the neorural experienced (1), the neorural less experienced (2), the suburban (3) and the urban (4). The results show that the Permaculture MESMIS methodology works as a tool designed to specifically evaluate permaculture-planned lands. The obtained scores for all the profile groups reveal an increase in ecological well-being status through the permaculture ethics and design principles incorporation. Considering all data in hand, the behaviour follows the same trends confirming permaculture as a positive way to promote nature reconnection.
Copyright (c) 2023 Arthur Nanni https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0