Farm 2B

okay so the next area of environmental sustainability is energy provision uh again we should start with the need what would we really like to have do we really need electricity do we really need gas what would we miss if we would not have these would the community work properly if we would not have these or are they are there any regulatory measurements to this like in krishna valley because we have a lot of tourists we should have a certain amount of electricity otherwise we would not be able to give a permission to run a restaurant

so all these things should be taken into into measure and you have to you have to measure the right needs so it's not enough to say that we need electricity how much electricity would you need it's not enough to say that we need wood how much wood you you would need because how much that would determine exactly how you can develop your energy needs and your energy supply and after you know the numbers you can see whether you can produce it for yourself or you have to have it from somewhere outside if you can produce

it yourself it's the best thing so if you're in a climate where you need heating and you can hit by wood if you can plant a lot of forests where you can have your wood from that you don't need any wood to be bought from outside that's the best thing try to go into that direction but understand that that forestry should be done in a way uh that is sustainable just like i was saying that in krishna valley we determine we plan the agriculture based on the need based on the medical need of the or

the body type of the different devotees and based on the order of the kitchen here is the same thing uh with heating what kind of of heating tools where you use we use ceramic heaters or you would you would use like huge gasifiers because you would need different types of wood for those and you know forestry it's really it's not one lifetime usually it's two or three lifetimes mission because you plant a tree now and the shortest if it's in a natural environment the shortest you can you can harvest that in 20 25 years there

are these energy forests nowadays that's that's really popular it it could be really risky because energy for us usually means it's monoculture monoculture usually means that you will have a lot of problem with with the different viruses and bacteria and with the different insects so you would you would need a lot of pesticides and definitely those pesticides will not be natural those will be chemical pesticides so it's it's not that easy so you have to see what are the natural environment and what are the natural species that you can you can have there at your

farm but the best is if you can provide all your energy needs electricity it's really hard to produce what you need actually you can produce but you cannot produce solar panels you cannot produce wind generators you cannot produce the wires you cannot produce the the batteries these things should come from outside so yes you can say that we are producing this and this amount of kilowatts or megawatts even of electricity from our own resources but actually it's not your resources you had to get them from somewhere else from outside so so there are different means

of producing energy and you have to see whether that's sustainable and you have to move towards towards a more sustainable lifestyle and many times the energy consumption that's that's the that's the limit to a intentional community or to a farm when we look at the global eco village network then we can see that that this is a major major problem and usually having the proper amount of energy is the hardest thing to achieve when when it comes to an environmental sustainability so the best thing in regards to energy provision is that you have to decrease

the needs and this is one topic that you regularly have to revisit and you regularly have to discuss over and over again and you have to have a proper and broad educational system so the devotees who are there at the farm they understand why something is allowed and why something is not and you have to develop that education in a way that that that urge will come up in the devotees to reduce their energy need because if you can do that then your farm gradually will become more and more sustainable the next main area of

environmental sustainability is water provision so there are three main main qualities of the of water that we can speak about there is pure water that is grey water and black water or waste water pure water is usually used for drinking cooking and in some aspects for for washing grey water is really good for irrigation and it's really good after a gross purification process it's really good for washing and waste wastewater is usually good for after treatment is good for composting and certain types of irrigation the main thing usually with with water management is that we

have to keep the necessary amount of water in our on our area on our land in wet areas it would mean that they would need less water in dry areas just like in krishna valley we would need to keep as much water on the property as possible so you have to have planned water bodies you have to have some springs and lakes and you you have to try to keep the rain water on the land as much as possible you have to have rain water harvesting systems and don't think that these are these are some

industrial things this could be really small and really aesthetic things that that really looks really nice so so it's it's important that that you think along these three lines pure water grey water gray water and waste water so all these things have to be taken into measure and you have to secure your water resource that means that one water resource is not enough at least two or best is to have three four water resources or wells in christian valley what we did is that we have a 330 meters deep well that provides enough water for

the whole farm and plus at each and every houses we have a 20 25 meters deep well and that provides water for irrigation around the houses and if you pull the water uh regularly from those wells then those will be purified and you can even drink that water so you you have to have a proper handling and management of water in regards to to waste water in regards to wastewater it's important to treat the wastewater and treat it uh there on the property because there are a lot of uh elements in the wastewater that can

be used and as we were speaking about the linking of the different functional areas of agriculture or or areas of the farm wastewater is something that you can you can really use in agriculture after proper treatment and you have to find out what are what are the different uh legal aspects of having a wastewater treatment system on your property and what kind of environmental and ecological wastewater treatments are available in your area in krishna valley we have a reed bed zone sewage system it's a zero chemical zero energy sewage system and it works 97 during

winter time that's the purification percentage so 97 purified water and we keep it in a huge lake and we use it for irrigation irrigating a forest that's just beside it so in this way we should have a proper structure for environmental sustainability when it comes to water management the next area is waste management this is a a very tricky area because usually we look at waste at at as it is garbage but actually it's it's not and we again have to start with our need what's our consumption pattern what are the different things that we

use on our farm that will produce waste and how that waste can be treated of course we know all these things that and that selective waste management should be there so we we selectively keep the compostable the biodegradable elements we separate in the the glass and we separate the plastic we separate the metal things so we separate these things for a purpose and the purpose is reusing those so yes in in krishna valley we also separate paper from em from from and everything else and until we have that consciousness how these are useful for the

community the separatis selective waste management will not work it's not something that you put the three four five different waste baskets everywhere you have to educate the devotees how it will be useful and unless they see that it's useful in their own personal life they will not buy into it so waste management starts with education it doesn't start with handling the waste handling the waste is it will be natural once the devotees understand the need for that just like in krishna valley we were thinking about putting up selective waste management areas in different parts of

krishna valley but we figured out that we don't really need it hundred percent of the time because because of the education the devotees at their home they use glass they reuse glass because they put preserves in it or they put different drinks in it or they use it for for gardening or any other purposes they use plastic plastic bottles for for gardening and for for other purposes because that's that's really good especially when you start planting something and you need some safe area for that little little little tiny plant that you put a glass or

a plastic bottle on the top of it and then it will grow much naturally it will grow in a much safer environment so all these things can be used and the devotees are using paper because we are hitting by wood and paper is really good to ignite the fire so all these things are are used there at their homes and there are not so many things to select when it comes to the general waste that we then that that we try to selectively handle anyhow so so we should we should separate two major things when

it comes to waste management one is the everyday waste and the other is the large gatherings waste or we could say the project waste general everyday waste can be handled by the individual devotees locally but project waste like if there is a huge festival for john jamastami and there are a lot of devotees are coming then you have to plan up in front how to handle that waste that will that will come from eight that thousand twenty thousand or even a million people who are visiting your temple for yamashitami or for any other festivals and

that planning that really helps to to have a proper waste management like in krishna valley we have a festival for three days for non-devotees and around six to seven thousand people coming we we sell around three tons of prashadam so there are a lot of a lot of waste paper plates and spoons and all the other things other things are there and previously you know like 10 years back we used plastic but then it ended up you know in the in the waste baskets that should be transferred uh to to the dump area but then

we started replacing those with biodegradable plates and since then you know after the open days the three days festival we have a lot of biodegradable plate that are composted within three to six months and that can be used that can be used in cultivation of vegetables and and other agricultural produce so with proper planning proper waste management could be dealt with the fifth area of environmental sustainability is transportation there are three major kind of transportation that you usually use one is your local transportation the other is a longer distance transportation and the third is international

transport so when it when it comes to transportation you should see what you are transporting are you transporting goods you're transporting people are you and you have to see what is the pattern of transportation so when it comes to the pattern of transportation you you have to see whether whether devotees can be grouped whether goods can be grouped so the amount of transport is reduced to a minimum and try to use those transportation methods that are that are more environmental friendly locally you can walk there's no harm in walking and actually it's a really good

exercise for everyone some people say that 10 000 steps a day that really decreases different diseases in the body like like heart problems and and other diseases so 10 000 steps it's it's not it's not too much and so walking is really important or you can bike you can ride the bike if if there's a little longer distance locally that that you can or you you have to take and when it comes to to cars or buses try to share it try to group the devotees so that that you travel together and if you go

for shopping then then try to ask other devotees if they would like to go shopping and then jump in the car together and then go and do the shopping together so that reduces the uh the environmental impact uh by 50 just by having someone else in your car and having the the shopping together also it's it's it's important to reduce shopping because you can produce a lot of things locally but also it's important to to have larger shoppings like like you go once in every second week or once a month and you shop larger stocks

usually it's cheaper usually it's less energy it's it it actually helps everyone to reduce the impact on the environment and if it comes to to international travel well usually it's not so easy to handle that in an environmental way but try to reduce the amount of international travel as much as you can so the next area of environmental sustainability is the construction as we can see that construction sites are quite ugly they don't look so nice and it's obvious that it makes a lot of it it gives a lot of stress to the environment so

when we are constructing we have to see what are the materials that are locally available what are the uh not just materials but what are the methods so other than the local materials we should see what are the local methods that are available for the devotees to make their own construction materials there's a really important thing that there should be professional engineers who understand uh how to construct buildings it's not that that someone will just start it and then he constructs a building and then it will collapse so safety first try to see what are

the available materials what are the available methods and try to have professionals on site who will who will see and who will oversee the method of construction and have everything in place it is really important in regards to construction that you always have to follow the regulations the governmental regulations those are there for your own safety those are not there because someone just figured out that this should be the safety features of construction so it is important to always follow those regulate those regulations and that the government is giving in regards to construction it is

important that we have to see what are what are the individual needs in the in the house how will he use the house uh what what what are the times of the day when he will use the house what are the areas of the wind that are coming in i'm not going so much in the into the details of of constructing buildings there are professionals and vastu professionals who who knows this much better but it's important to have a proper understanding and a proper engineer who can deal with construction based on the needs of the

community and the individuals who will live in the different houses so the last area of environmental sustainability is actually not so much in the environmental sustainability part but it's so important that it cannot be emphasized enough and that is education so all the devotees who are there or on the farm or in your community should be educated regularly and education should be done for the children for the adults for the families for the individuals for the different groups of devotees who are doing different services like for the kitchen devotees for the agricultural devotees for the

leaders there should be proper education set so that they understand what impact they and they give to the environment and how to tackle those how to reduce our impact and how how to reduce our ecological footprint on the environment so when it comes to the environment that we try to live in usually we try to strive for for three main things sustainability functionality and aesthetic view we would like to have every everything around the sustainable on the long term we would like to have everything functional around us we would like to see everything that's nice

around us so when we develop our environmental management structure when we develop our agriculture when we develop our construction methods when we develop anything surrounding us we should always think about how it should be sustainable functional and aesthetic hare krishna thank you for being with me for the environmental sustainability part of the farm management course