VAT: Vietnamese Acronym for Garden, Fishpond, and Animal Sheds

VAC is an acronym for the Vietnamese words for garden, fishpond, and animal sheds. This integrated home garden exemplifies the manner in which many native peoples came to actively manage their environment to benefit local ecosystems while providing for their own needs. In a VAC, waste from animals feeds fish, the pond water fertilizes and irrigates the gardens, and overlapping layers of productive vegetation yield vegetables, fruit, and herbs. A VAC can provide for the majority of a family’s needs, and the surplus sold at local markets might provide substantial income. At the same time, a VAC is home to an incredible diversity of flora and fauna and efficiently cycles energy, water, and organic matter in a mostly closed-loop system. VAC gardens can still be found throughout Vietnam today. Some of these gardens are three hundred years old and still producing food! Grounded in ecological principles established over centuries of experience, they serve as inspiration for those of us who, looking ahead to an uncertain future, hope to build upon the past.

(From The Permaculture Promise by Jono Neiger)