The good news is that it is still possible to hand in grant application in some European countries!

Full Funding available!

Those working in the field of adult education (in the broadest sense) can apply for a Grundtvig Grant covering all costs including travel, accommodation & conference fee.

To be eligible, you have to be a resident of a EU member state, Croatia, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Turkey. (For details check out your national office providing the grant [http://ec.europa.eu/education/lifelong-learning-programme/doc1208_en.htm] or get in touch with our contact person.)

Procedure!

First of all, you do not have to register and will not need a confirmation letter from us, because this course is going to be a seminar. You will have to fill in an e-form, which can be found on the webpage of your country’s National Agency dealing with Grundtvig grants, where you will have to register. So, please check out the homepage of your agency at the following link (http://ec.europa.eu/education/lifelong-learning-programme/national_en.htm) and get in contact with the national office in your country, which deals with grants of the European Commission. They will inform you about the details.

It is important that you have to apply for a grant in the Visits and exchanges category.

Check the following link for this: http://ec.europa.eu/education/grundtvig/staff_en.htm

You can find the description of the seminar in the Comenius – Grundtvig Training Database with the reference number “HU-2012-119-001“.

(Here is the link separately:
http://ec.europa.eu/education/trainingdatabase/index.cfm?fuseaction=DisplayCourse&cid=33008.)

If you contacted your national agency about the grant and checked the webpages above, then come back to us and we will continue our cooperation.

The deadline for grant application in some European countries differs, so it is NOT 30th April, 2012 everywhere. Therefore, we urge every enthusiastic person, who would like to take part in the seminar, to check the deadline at their National Agencies and apply for a grant as soon as possible.

The photos, a video from Kapos TV and a few Pdf format of presentations (in Hungarian!) will show you some of the details.

To watch the video click here to go to the link of Kapos TV.

Download the Pdf format of presentations here (in Hungarian):

József Hegyesi: A model for self-sufficient family homestead (Pdf)

Organic farming in the Két Kuvik farm (Pdf)

Eco-ssociation – here is the solution to townspeople.

The Két Kuvik organic farm – exemplary farming on 50 hectares of land

Having lunch and getting acquainted with residents of Krishna Valley

Practical demonstration in the cowshed

A spiral van – inserting grains from the top and getting cleaned seeds at the bottom

Chief organizer, Vilmos Pőcze with Kapos TV

Szilvia Rév and András Kun

The week of the Workshop consisted of a mixture of lectures, workshops, discussions and practical field trips to inspect the different aspects of the community, such as the cowshed, ox-powered technology, school, fields, vegetable patches, grain and fruit storages, waste management, infrastructure, the small cottage industries and oil-pressing machines, the residential areas, and of course, the central building with its restaurant.

During the week the participants were trained in several topics of social, economical and environmental stability in rural farm communities, using Krishna Valley as the example for such a community in order to extract and possibly expand its principles more generally to the whole of Europe.

Every day started with a presentation on one of the topics of sustainability, such as what are the needs to achieve social stability, the need for a constitution and clear mission, how to manage and control the economy in a self-sufficient community and the practical aspects of environmental and ecological sustainability and self-sufficiency. All these were used to develop learners’ systematic understanding of social, economic, and environmental correlation of community management and a skill for systematic approach. This was followed by workshops where participants sat together in groups to discuss how to practically realize a similar community of their own dreams.

The field trips in the afternoons took the participants to different areas of the model community, such as the vegetable fields, vegetable and grain storages, the pastures, the cowshed, the community’s own school, the private residential areas, the reed-bed zone sewage system, etc. The participants appreciated how the community functions 90 percent without electricity with all heating done by wood burners using wood from the community’s own forests.

The last part of the day was devoted to a game fashioned by Zoltán Hosszú, head of Eco Valley Foundation and other members of the foundation’s team, where participants in a kind of strategy game on the “Real Pillars of Sustainability” (that was the name of the game itself) amused themselves with questions and quandaries from real life management experienced by themselves and other community managers’ leadership over the years.

Interesting was also one of the days when during a field trip participants went outside the community into the surrounding village and neighbouring area. Here another 60 members of the community have bought houses and are gradually having a very positive influence in this somewhat impoverished part of Hungary.

The six days seminar was concluded by an address of the community leader, Sivarama Swami who stated that small-scale communities could survive and develop only by supporting each other as individuals and as communities.

Krishna Valley briefly: the community was started in 1993 on 150 hectares of empty field and pastures. Since then this has been increased to 266 hectares, where residents have constructed 53 buildings for residential purposes, barns for the animals, an administration building, a restaurant and of course, a central building.

Pasturing lands and vegetable fields have been established, wells dug and around 300 000 trees planted establishing a botanic garden and a few forests. The farm community has attracted a lot of attention, not only from their society, but also from the greater public, including the 30 000 tourists who visit every year, as a very ideal attempt to establish an ecologically and socially self-sustaining community that can be a model for similar communities around the world. It is the hope of the community to be able to facilitate similar seminars and conferences for all interested people over the years to come.

The Eco Valley Foundation organized its fourth conference on sustainability in Krishna Valley. We had 132 guests on the event held on 5th October. The topic of this year’s conference was ecological farming; therefore, we tried to pass on the experience of Krishna Valley’s organic farming through captivating and inspiring presentations.

The afternoon programs followed the morning lectures and round-table discussions, when ecological farming experts showed the audience their everyday practices. The display of various skills symbolically demonstrated to the participants the way bread is made, from sowing to harvesting and baking. However, they also learned about the bits and pieces of ecological dairy production and organic gardening.

Participants could make food on the traditional clay stove.

Attendees had the opportunity to see plowing with oxen, an ox-powered mill, a show of wheat grinding and baking roundel on a traditional clay stove. In relation to sowing guests saw the making of wheatgrass juice and could taste the delicious drink. Besides the freshly baked roundel there was a display to see the ins and outs of butter and cheese making. Furthermore, in the cellar one could learn the methods of storing the different produces of the organic garden.

We would like to warmly welcome everyone to a conference regarding the various procedures and options of reducing the ecological footprint. This conference will be held in Krishna-valley on behalf of the Eco-valley foundation.
One of the major aims of the conference is to show how it is possible to maintain the ecological footprint of a community within the sustainable boundaries. In other words, how one can put sustainability into practice as well as how can a community live and function in an environment-friendly way.

Patron of conference: Gábor Vida, academician
Among the many speakers there are going to be the leaders of Krishna-valley and lecturers, researchers from universities and colleges.
Another point of interest is that we asked four university students to speak of their work concerning the results of their Eco-valley research.
During the day there will be work-shops in small groups to have the opportunity to speak to Krishna-valley’s specialists in various fields.
Title of Conference: Do your shoes pinch? Change them to a smaller one! Our ecological footprint and sustainability
Date: 15th October, 2009; 9.00 am – 5.00 pm
Venue: Krishna-valley, Somogyvámos
No entry-fee to the conference, but only if you register in advance!
Registrations should be sent to the following email address until 5th October, 2009:
info at okovolgy.hu
Necessary data for registration:
Name, email address, occupation, workplace/institute
The programme also includes a free vegetarian meal as well.

Schedule

9.00-9.50     Arrival and registration
10.00     Gábor Vida (member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences), patron of conference: Inaugural address and opening
10.40     Partha dasa (Director of country planning, Krishna-valley) and Ákos Bede Fazekas (student, University of Corvinus): The importance of eco-villages, local solutions. Studies of the various flora of climate change.

11.00     Radha Kanta dasa (Director of agriculture, Krishna-valley) and Csaba Dániel Lánczi (graduate student of University of Eötvös Loránd, Budapest): Sustainable farming, bio-farming. The ecological footprint of Krishna-valley.
11.20     Break (scones, herbal tea)
11.40     Premamoya dasa (Director of education, Krishna-valley) and Réka Tóth (student, University of Pécs): Social sustainability and education. Child upbringing and education in Krishna-valley.

12.00     Radha Krishna dasa (Director of Eco-valley Foundation) and Barna Giczi (student, University of Pécs): Buttresses of sustainability. Social sustainability.

12.20     Announcement of afternoon programme
12.30-13.30     Lunch break

13.30-14.30     „Fieldwork” workshops: conversations in seven different topics with the leaders of Krishna-valley and other speakers of the morning lectures.
(Only one workshop can be attended! All the groups start out from the temple entrance to the various scenes of the eco-valley.)

Available workshops:
1.    Eco-villages and the fauna of climate change – Partha dasa and Ákos Bede Fazekas
2.    Sustainable farming, ecological footprint – Radha Kanta dasa and Csaba Dániel Lánczi
3.    Social sustainability and education – Premamoya dasa and Réka Tóth
4.    Buttresses of sustainability – Radha Krishna dasa and Barna Giczi
5.    Biogardening – Sundara Gopala dasa (Head of the gardening department of Krishna-valley)
6.    Herbal medication, vegetarianism – Sundari dasi (Director of social welfare of Krishna-valley)
7.    Economic sustainibility – Radha Radya dasa (Chief accountant of Krishna-valley)

14.40 Radha Krishna dasa: Introduction of the last year achievements of the Eco-valley Program

14.55 Awarding the Eco-valley Prize

15.00 Judit Farkas (University of Pécs): Research experience in the Eco-valley Program

15.15 Ákos Malatinszky (SZIE-KTI): Students pro sustainability – The activities of the past 19 years of GATE Zöld Klub Egyesület (University of Gödöllő, Green Association) from Gödöllő

15.30 Mutual signing of cooperative documentation and speech of cooperative partners

16.30 Gaura Sakti dasa (President of Krishna-valley): The role of Eco-valley Program in developing sustainable national culture and customs

16.50 Closing words

Dr Miklós Persányi (director of Budapest Zoo, former Environmental Minister) gave a presentation called “Does climate indulge for future?”. He presented the situation of the approaching ecological, economical and social crisis and the importance of enviro-consciousness education for children.

The following guests gave a presentation as well: Ernő Csirke (director of five schools in Pécs), Partha das (Environmental Director of Krishna-valley) and Premamoja das (Education Director of Krishna-valley).

After the presentation the guests were given a tour on the farm. The organic garden, the Cow-protection Centre and the elementary school were introduced by Sundara-gopala das, Govinda-nandana das and Dvaipayana das.

Our guests expressed their aim to cooperate with us in many ways. Most of the participant would like to arrange school-excursions, but cooperation in organizing “Eco-logic” study circle and Eco-camps were suggested by several teachers as well.

To join our program more application form those schools who could not participate on this event are most welcomed.