NATURE AND LANDSCAPE DEVELOPMENT ON ORGANIC FARMS

The question: 'What do we see as a good landscape?' should not only be answered by landscape ecologists and architects but also by the farme rs themselves. The basic farming concept in biodynamic fanning is refe rred to as managing the 'farm individuality' (or farm identity). There fore, this concept can be used as an appropriate criterion for nature and landscape development on organic/biodynamic farms. Then the questi on arises: How can we use the concept of farm individuality in landsca pe planning? At least three problems have to be solved. First, we must have a method to describe the farm individuality. Secondly, the peopl e who live and work on the farm are part of the farm individuality, so they should participate in the planning process. Thirdly, landscape i s perceived as a dynamic system and individuality is also a dynamic co ncept. In this paper a scientific method is presented, designed for la ndscape development at farm level, based on the concept of farm indivi duality and a Goethean-phenomenological approach. This method, complem entary to the usual scientific approach, is used to come to grips with the farm as 'a whole', as 'an individuality'. The method can be chara cterised as a 'bottom-up' rather than a 'top-down' approach. It enable s farmers to cooperate in landscape planning with all their ideas, fee lings and future plans about their farm. The method will be illustrate d on work recently done on a Dutch biodynamic farm, the 'Noorderhoeve' .As identity is a recent overall goal for landscape management, as for mulated by the Dutch government, the method is not only relevant to bi odynamic farmers, but to conventional farmers as well. (C) 1997 Elsevi er Science B.V.