Let's take a serious look... PART 2

 Hopefully you have played around with creating a systems model. There are several open source (free) solvers out there and this mechanism allows you to look at outcomes with various input changes.  

So how do we size the critical components required?  Lets start with some assumptions like, 2500 calories a day for each person, about 900,000 calories per year.  This can be achieved with 3 acres of land per person if a mixed diet of grains and livestock.  So for a 100 person village, that is a land need of 200 acres which if detailed contains the crops, a pasture, housing, forest for wood and hunting, and wells.

This property could be subdivided into areas that are primary spaces for: housing, greenhouses, livestock shelters like chicken coops, orchards and apiary, stable crops like wheat, corn, beans and potatos (you may have very different crops depending on where you live. Another area considered to be managed forest which would provide firewood, foraging and hunting opportunity. What ever is left should be your biodiversity reserve for pollinators, birds and other wild life.

Let's make an attempt to design this property. In your planning an allocation strategy must be agreed upon so chaos is kept to a minimum.  Let's start with dividing up those 200 acres with 15 acres alloted for housing, cooking common areas and repair shops. 20 acres for a vegetable garden, 80 acres for the staple crops like grains, beans and potatoes. You will need a pasture for livestock - another 50 acres. Set aside 15 acres for orchards. The remainder for forest management for wood needed for heating, cooking and a hunting zone.  

Energy could be provided by solar panels for electricity, wood for heating and cooking and wind chargers, maybe hydro if you have a stream.  

You will need to diversify your food system.  Core crops will be your high calorie staple foods, things like potatoes, corn, wheat and beans.  Nutritionally you will need leafy greens, fruits and nuts.

Complementary livestock benefits from animals like chickens are eggs, protein and pest control, cows can give milk, beef and cheese. even goats can be useful for milk and land clearing.  So the animals are part of the system and may have several functions.

Finally all of this work will yield a bountiful harvest which requires some place to store the yield. Here preservation can be achieved with below ground "root" cellars, canning, fermentation, drying grains and beans. All necessary to survive a winter.

Now lets turn our attention to labor.  A village of 100 people might break down to something like this: 50 people involved in food production, 10 more keeping the infrastructure maintained.  Another 10 involved in healthcare and eduction, 10 more in food storage and processing.  That leaves 20 to cover governance, logistics, and back up redundancy.

Governance might look like a voted in council to make resource allocation decisions, conflict resolution and rule enforcement.  Done right, cultural cohesion can be achieved.

Next time we'll spend some time pondering how do we make this happen.