In 2000 the SEKEM initiative in Egypt celebrated its 21st anniversary. Begun in 1979 by Ibrahim Abouleish, the first practical initiative was the establishing of a biodynamic farm on 70 hectares of desert 60km north east of Cairo. Growing in the desert is no new task in Egypt. Its long history of civilization is based upon the successful exploitation of the natural annual flooding of the Nile Delta. However, using biodynamic methods to help in such a reclamation project is new. The enhanced life-carrying abilities that result from the use of biodynamics are known. In Australia, where there are many biodynamic farms, it was the ability of BD farms to remain green after neighboring farms had already turned brown which encouraged many of those neighbours to apply the BD preparations themselves and in Ireland the military, which became  curious about BD farms because of the increased infra-red (warmth) detected on satellite pictures, which , on investigation, was associated with land managed biodynamically.

By 1981 the Sekem BD farm was shipping its first active ingredients of medicinal herbs to the USA and two years later was producing its medicinal herb products for local markets. It is has been stated, in biodynamic circles, that the farm is the university of the future. The presumption is that the future health of farming relies upon a renewed community interest in the land and that the potency and value of future education, for the individual, will arise by reconnecting our purely abstract process-learning with the living forms and processes of nature. It is interesting, then, that the next step at Sekem was the establishment of a technical college: ‘The Egyptian Society of Cultural Development’, which offers vocational training in the arts and sciences.

 

Meanwhile trading agreements and associative arrangements were being made with European suppliers, including Weleda and the range of crops was diversifying.

The Mosque Building at Sekem

At each stage in the development process the new projects worked out of an associative spirit, which had the effect of mutually strengthening all of the various endeavours.  Thus it was that the process was only further enhanced by the founding of a primary and secondary school in 1989, based upon the Steiner curriculum, for the workers in the Sekem initiative.

Diversification and extension of the farm into biodynamic cotton production and vegetables led to the first cotton exports to Germany and BD vegetable exports to various locations in Europe in 1990. In the same year a new ‘product development, sales promotion and consumer research office’ was established, along with regional Sekem offices in several major Egyptian cities. By 1992 the project began manufacturing and marketing Weleda products under license in Egypt and became the principle standards agency for organic production in Egypt, with responsibility for ensuring quality standards for all European organic and biodynamic exports to Europe.

 

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By 1994 things had further developed to such a stage that Sekem was now exporting its own cotton clothing to Germany, having added clothing manufacture to is abilities.

doll-making workshop

In 1996 a medical clinic was opened to offer a full range of medical services to its, by then, 2000 employees and to the villages in the surrounding region. With the cooperation of Weleda, research programs were initiated with departments in the major Egyptian universities and the production range of pharmaceuticals was increased.

At the same time the various needs of the farming, educational and manufacturing initiatives necessitated the establishment of a new company to provide coordinated business support services to all the Sekem initiatives.

This level and speed of development is impressive by any standards. The entire project, which by this time was rather a whole series of co-independent complementary projects, was recognized as an example par excellence for international sustainable development. The year 2000 saw the establishment of the Sekem Academy for Applied Arts and Science, which hosts the development, training and discussion of many subjects, including the art of eurythmy.

The Egyptian Society for Cultural Development

(Sekem Academy)

In the processes of thinking, feeling and willing the

key to good health is in a three-way balance between these three distinct functions. In contrast, the one-sided over development of any one of these will be to the overall detriment of the whole human system. So it is also with the social realm. The development of a free spiritual culture, a fraternal economic life and an equitable social life, in which there is the space for every human voice to be heard should create a balanced and living dynamic social form in which all of the essential social elements are accounted for. Often our own anthroposophically inspired institutions strongly reflect the needs of the free spirit. They tend to answer a therapeutic/educational need, whilst their funding, by and large, tends to be an ongoing struggle. In contrast the Sekem initiatives are working out of a strong sense of associative economics in which the funding for the cultural institutions arises directly out of the success of its high quality integrated approach to working with the stuff of the physical world. In their turn the results arising out of the culture, the research and the education, feeds directly back into the inspiration of new industry. And where is the middle realm, the social in all of this? To give one example would be to point to the regular morning meetings of all of the businesses in which all of the participants, regardless of their skilled rank meet in circle to briefly explain what they managed to achieve yesterday and what they hope to do today. This echoes one of Steiner’s observations to economists that the participants in any endeavour must carry with them a picture of the whole, if the whole is to be truly productive.

One of the morning worker meetings