Restoration and development of permaculture farm

INFO PACK

Where: Merboltice, Czech Republic

When: 27^th June - 10th July 2022 - two-weeks activity

Who: ten European volunteers of age 18-30 years. Having EU or Ukrainian residency

Project aims

Meet together and share the present moment supporting the place of Hvozd: We would like to turn a small building into the outside kitchen, equipe the space by wooden shelves. Also build an outside shower in the garden. Save stone walls of the ruin, and rebuild it into multifunctional space. Thanks to this transformation we can save the cultural heritage and create a place for physical and educative activities of our association as yoga, theater performances or dance workshops. Meanwhile we would like to do orchard maintenance and harvest berries. Introduction of permacultural principles will be part of the project, and talks about unconditional basic income as a tool for sustainable society too.

Activities description

First three days of activity will be dedicated to:

introduction Spolek Hvozd NGO, its principles and center itself. Socializing volunteers with all members. Going through concrete working plans. Presentation of village by walking through and visiting our closest partners "Hospodářství pod Strážným Vrchem" - ecological farm.

After we consider participants set we start common daily framework. The first week´s priority will be educating participants by Introduction Course of permaculture.

In the first week we will start to build up main and functional structures: wood structures for dance floor, improve outside kitchen and maintain fruit trees and orchard.

During second week we come to final works and some carpentry like crafting wooden benches etc. In last days we focus on organising and performing on the "big party" where we will celebrate the ceremonial opening of dance-floor with locals people from village and other artists.

Everything we realise in our NGO and will apply in this project in cooperation with participants comes from basic principles of sustainability, from our experience, and from the conclusion of the collective.

Manual tasks:

Cook food and clean dishes together: from local sources of vegetables or organic supplies for everybody with strong ethic attitude.

Building renovation as stone-walls excavation and theirs stabiliing by tiny top layer of concrete and wooden planks . Except of wooden floor nailing itself will craft benches from massive wood etc.

Grass cutting: we will need to help with the scything of the grass and afterwards it's composting, we will do it by hand instrument scythe. The advantage of this tool is that group of people can talk together meanwhile.

Fire wood: chopping of the wood for winter by axe is evergreen activity in the farms which are warmed up from local sources of wood.

Making preserves: bounty of the summer is good to keep for winter as well. We can do jams or preserves or dry fruit.

CONTEXT of volulnteering activities

Participants will experience cultural diversity in an international team. This environment will offer a great opportunity for inclusion when planning and working together with other youths from various European countries is essential. The issues of climate change go beyond the personal and even national individuality, therefore, experience in project based on international cooperation of partners organisations and participants from six different countries is very beneficial with the potential of developing this cooperation in subsequent future projects.

During the stay at Spolek Hvozd, volunteers will be led by experienced members of our NGO covering various topics and then they will be applying their new knowledge and suggestions directly in hands-on activities. Using this style of learning, cooperation and application of knowledge directly will help to deepen our volunteers’ social and communication skills and also, increase awareness of their own and other cultures.

The participants will experience closeness and community, but also the need for using boundaries and clear communication. It all will require and hopefully strengthen their sense of solidarity. We have prepared daily team-building activities as well as one-day trip out of the place of the Activity to support and enhanced the learning experience. The participants' team activities in the multicultural surrounding will teach effective planning, implementation and evaluation of tasks. Based on our good experience, it is useful to divide the whole group of participants into smaller teams.

Each team is then focusing on and solving different tasks.

All participants will be able to spend meaningful time in an environment with limited opportunities for using modern technologies. This may help them be more mindful, focus on themselves, pay attention to others and the project itself.

In general, we expect the participants to develop and increase their creativity and their ability to improvise.

How to apply?

Send us email to spolekhvozd(a)gmail.com, you can add your motivation statement with photo, and fill up the online form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSePlwBvHHqMuCsCC_qjIuncF2G62ivcasZpVd2CmUjM8fvmgw/viewform?usp=sf_link

After that we will contact You.