— ABOUT THE PUBLICATION
A serious publication on self-reliance.
Survival & Prepping is a publication for people early in their journey toward self-reliance — and the rest of us who've been at it long enough to know how much we still don't know. We cover personal security, off-grid living, homesteading at any scale, food storage, and the mindset and skills that make preparedness real rather than theatrical.
We exist because most of what's written in this field is one of three things: fearmongering written to sell something, gear-fetishising written for people who already know what they're doing, or thin SEO content written by people who've never done any of it. We are none of those things.
We are a calm, evidence-led publication, written by a small editorial team with real experience and real specialisations. Our founder spent two years doing urban counterinsurgency work — what we called COIN ops — for the South African military, and was a founder member of the SA Bodyguards Association. He now homesteads off-grid on nine hectares in rural South Africa — solar, borehole, vegetable gardens, aquaponics, the slow ongoing project of becoming more self-sufficient. Our contributors are practitioners, not generalists, and we will say so on every byline.
We publish because we believe the field deserves better — and because the kind of person who's just realised they need to start preparing deserves a place to read that doesn't talk down to them, doesn't try to scare them, and doesn't try to sell them gear they don't need.
— OUR READER
Who we write for, and what we expect of them.
We write for adults who've decided that self-reliance is worth taking seriously, and who want to learn it from people who've done it.
That includes people who live in townhouses and want to know what preparedness looks like in 70 square metres. People in suburban houses with a yard, working out where to start. People on smallholdings figuring out what comes after the basics. People on working farms refining systems that have been running for years. We do not draw a line between "preppers" and "homesteaders" — they're the same project at different scales — and we explicitly don't write for one demographic at the exclusion of the other.
We expect our readers to be adults. We will not pretend that the world is more dangerous than it is, or less. We will not flatter you, frighten you, or pretend that buying the right product solves the problem. We assume you can read prose, weigh evidence, and make decisions for yourself.
— OUR PRINCIPLES
How we work.
We hold ourselves to six editorial principles, in this order of priority:
Skills over gear.
Most preparedness writing is gear-led. Ours is skills-led. The right knowledge applied with the wrong equipment will keep you safer than the right equipment in the hands of someone who doesn't know how to use it. Gear gets covered when gear matters; otherwise, we'd rather teach you something.
Citation discipline on safety-critical work.
Pressure canning, water purification, electrical work, structural changes, anything where a mistake can hurt someone — we cite primary sources, name our experts, and have specialist contributors review the work. Where there's no safety implication we relax the rule, but the standard is real.
No fearmongering.
We will not pretend an event is more likely than it is to make you read further. We will not use urgency hooks, doomsday framing, or "the experts don't want you to know" rhetoric. The world is uncertain enough.
No politics.
Self-reliance is not a political position. People across every political tradition have practised it for as long as people have lived. We don't write about which party caused which problem; we write about how to be ready when problems arrive.
Evergreen first.
We'd rather write one piece that is right for ten years than ten pieces that chase next week's news. The pillar guides on this site are revised, not retired.
Transparent about ourselves.
We'll tell you when a contributor is the genuine expert and when we're synthesising the work of others. We'll tell you when something we recommend is something we've used ourselves and when it isn't. We'll tell you when we earn an affiliate commission. We'll never run sponsored content disguised as editorial.
— THE FOUNDER
Founded by someone who has done the work.
The publication was founded, and is edited, by a former South African military operator who spent two years in urban counterinsurgency — what was called COIN ops at the time — and who was a founder member of the South African Bodyguards Association. He has practiced martial arts his whole life, with deep training in JKA Karate, Tenshinkan Karate, and Aki Jitsu, and operational experience in close-quarters work. He now lives off-grid on nine hectares in rural South Africa, where he is slowly building a more self-sufficient life: vegetable gardens, an aquaponics system, borehole-based water, and a solar installation in progress.
The decision to keep the founder's name and face off the public site is a deliberate one. The work the publication covers — security in particular — is one where surfacing a face and a location is operationally unwise. Our named contributors do appear under their own names; the founder doesn't. The credentials carry the weight; the byline reads "the Editorial Desk."
If you'd like to verify the credentials privately for legitimate purposes — partnership, journalism, expert collaboration — please contact us through the editorial desk and we will respond appropriately.
— CONTRIBUTORS
Who else writes here.
The publication is not a one-person project. We deliberately bring in named contributors with hands-on experience in their pillars, because authority on self-reliance is built by people who've done the thing — and we don't believe in pretending otherwise.
Contributors are being announced soon. Our staff writer will join the publication this quarter, and our homesteading editor — who has spent more than two decades working a smallholding — will be joining shortly after. Both will be listed here under their own names.
— CONTACT
Get in touch.
For editorial inquiries, expert collaboration, contributor pitches, or partnerships, you can reach us through the editorial desk.
For privacy and operational reasons we do not publish a physical address.