Sprout Village

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We are currently in a growth-based, capitalist, consumerist, globalised economy. This required growth relies on debt creation, and without the creation of debt, the whole economy collapses in on itself. The consequences of this type of society are drastic.

 

We have reached the point where we are living beyond the earth's capacities. The 'magnitude of overshoot' is incredible. The ecological footprints of many of the richest humans are much too large for the earth, and the extent of our impact is such that our current time has been called the Anthropocene, referencing humanity's measurable effects on the natural world. Biodiversity has suffered, and climate change has begun and will continue to drastically worsen. Peak oil is soon approaching, if it hasn't happened already. The population is growing and billions already do not have a good quality of life. Inequality is growing and global injustice occurs because of our current capitalist system. Wars are being waged over land and resources. Financial, economic, health and environmental crises are already occurring, and will gradually worsen until certain tipping points are reached, either in the economy or in the environment, when societal collapse is likely to occur. These tipping points may occur at similar times, worsening the global situation. This is the path we are currently on.

 

Some believe that we can decouple economic growth from environmental impact, or decarbonise a growing economy. Some believe that switching from fossil fuels to renewables will solve all our problems. Some believe that technology will save us and let us continue consuming at our current rates. But unfortunately this is not the case.

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No matter what we do now, the climate crisis will worsen, biodiversity loss will continue, and resource scarcity will have an impact on more people worldwide. However, there is a collection of solutions that we have the power to be involved in, to make our communities better and counteract the worst of the harms for some people.

 

First of all, energy descent must take place, and this comes with it a planned contraction of the economy. We need to institute degrowth policies and change the way our economies work. Once down to a sufficient point, we can move to a steady-state economy. We will have reached One Planet Living, while ensuring every human's basic needs are met.

 

Once in this new, simpler state of being, we will be living values espoused by the simple living, voluntary simplicity, and minimalism movements. The economy will be mostly circular. Most people will live in smaller communities, being more active in their community and will have a direct participation in the politics of their community. These new communities will have similarities to current eco-villages and intentional communities.

 

Housing will move to a more sustainable framework, with more buildings being made with natural building techniques, earthship principles and smaller homes overall. There will be more shared spaces that are managed cooperatively within the community. Homesteads will be more common, as well as homestead practices spread over the community level. A home-based lifestyle will be more common, instead of large houses sitting empty for most of the week while their occupants are at work.

 

A movement towards localisation will occur, with most of our food, fibre and other materials being sourced from nearby areas. Plastic-free and zero-waste lifestyles will be more common, and recycling will occur very little, since all products will be made to be reusable, repairable, and long-lasting. The salvage economy will increase while we work through all the waste of our current society, using what we can from what we have previously thrown away.

 

The way we grow our food will change. Certain activities such as composting, regenerative farming, no-till farming, and cover cropping will be much more common. Instead of large, distant, monocultural farms, we will have edible landscapes, community gardens and food forests comprised of organically grown polycultural food grown in soil with a healthy soil food web, with permaculture techniques and incorporating more perennial foods. Vegetarianism and veganism will be much more common, as we move towards diets with a lower environmental impact. The way we manage our wider environment will be different too, with afforestation and landscape rehydration taking place where sensible. Our use of oil-based farm machinery will have to drastically reduce. Plants can provide much of what we currently use oil and plastic products for.

 

As Mark Burch writes, we need to create a society where there is 'Enough, for everyone, forever'. This is the core of the simplicity and sustainability movements, and is what Sprout Village is working towards.

 

There are many examples of the important concepts listed above, with various groups around the world working in their own way to make a positive impact on our economy and the environment. Samuel Alexander puts it well in his book Sufficiency Economy by writing, "Real-world examples of sufficiency in practice are everywhere bubbling beneath the surface, threatening to expand into the mainstream … A sufficiency economy is not at all a utopian fantasy, but rather an embryonic, fragmented reality struggling away beneath the existing economy, trying to replace that economy with something fundamentally different."