The Edible Park

Where: Merboltice, Czech Republic

When: 18^th July 2021 - 1st August 2021 - two-weeks activity

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

Project aims of Edible park gathering

Meat together and share the present moment supporting the place of Hvozd: Improve and finish the unfinished projects what from past years, try to do some practical tasks by hands, put your shoulder to the wheel, learn to comunicate, improve the working skills

1- The Edible Park and Orchard

Our main aim is to turn our closest piece of farm-land into "The Edible Park Biotope". This limited 900 m² area will be planted by edible bushes to offer rich fruit and herb crops for humans, as well as a living space for insects and smaller animals that appears as a beautiful and cozy park full of hand-crafted architectural features like benches, swings, bush mazes, secret tunnels, etc. that will also be suitable for children.

One of the other aims is to add various habitats for a wide range of animal species into the park design. This will include a water pool reservoir, corners of wilderness, compost mound, various types of birdhouses and also a natural fence. The natural fence would be made by densely woven branches and twigs protecting the park against wild animals, such as deer and wild boars. This natural but well-protected habitat will enable us to plant about 150 edible bushes, such as black and red currant, honeysuckles, gooseberries and many other types of native edible bushes from which all local pollinators will benefit too. All the aspects mentioned above will increase our food self-sufficiency, provide a new space of practical use and increase natural diversity.

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 by team-building games. Going through design of EP and concrete working plans. Presentation of village by walking through and visiting our closest partners "Hospodářství pod Strážným Vrchem" - ecological farm hosting two ESC volunteers.

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

In the first week we will start to build up main and functional structures: wood structures, finishing water pools, improve outside kitchen, banches and maintain orchard.

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.

Finishing of water reservoirs: fixing an overflow pipe, creating a zone for planting of the water plants.

Finishing of tree house for children: we built the tree house which needs the safety barriers and the stairs.

Wooden gates: to the productive part of garden we miss easy enter. We will make massive gates together according our original design.

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 sing together their songs meanwhile.

Fire wood: chopping of the wood for winter by axe is evergreen activity in the farms which are wormed 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

The project „Edible Park Biotope“ (EPB) directly refers to issues of climate change and young people will get the chance to act immediately on a concrete project. Hands-on learning has been proved as the best way how to acquire and develop understanding, new skills and competencies which participants can apply in their home country.

Consequences of climate change have already struck in our region as unprecedented droughts, together with excessive use of chemicals in conventional agriculture, lead to a drastic insect-quantity decrease and even extinction of dozens of species.

Another side of the same coin is the reduction of natural habitats by the growth of human population and it's densely populated areas where people do not tolerate "wildness and bugs".

We wish to demonstrate the opposite kind of attitude in park micro-habitat where solidarity in sharing the space is key and where broad variability brings abundance.

Participants will also 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.