Eco Currency

The research provided in this project is a first step into a possible introduction of an ECO-currency. It is clear that the proposition provided is merely a concretization of the research and opens up a world of new questions. The proposition shows that many practical issues still need to be researched, designed for and validated. Future projects could use the foundations this project has laid, to dive into these new questions, and continue the rationale.

This blog is about linking the economical ecology with the environmental ecology. In the current economic climate there are so much voices and opinions about it that it becomes difficult to see the forest for the trees. Visualizing Economics tries to bring some clarity, and is exactly what it’s URL implies. Mostly about America, but interesting nonetheless. Thanks for the link Philip.

An intersting article on New York Times website today.

UNITED NATIONS — Governments are largely ignoring a biodiversity protection treaty they signed 17 years ago, allowing the rate of species decline to continue at an alarming rate, the United Nations said in a report released today.

In the movie ‘Home’, by Yann Arthus-Bertrand a beautiful image of our earth is given. The movie starts of from how live began on planet earth and how only by a perfect balance between every form of life and every resource, the earth as it is today can be the way it is. This balance though is drastically changing through the acts of humans, resources that took 4 million years to find its position in this balance are ripped out of their balanced places which has drastic effects on the climate and the ecosystem of the entire world.

Kickstarter is a funding platform for artists, designers, filmmakers, musicians, journalists, inventors, explorers etc. On this platform, creative projects can be displayed and a funding can be requested. People have to explain what they want to do and how much money they need. It’s close to the platform designed in one of the scenarios how to apply eco-currency; stewardship, where an online platform is used to show projects and to gain money.

Interim exhibition set-up

Last week we used a little experimental set-up during the mid-term exhibitions to get some initial feedback on the stewardship scenario. A tangible version of our concept platform was presented. Visitors were free to propose projects and post them on the platform. Each visitor also got three votes (lego blocks) to place next to flags on the world map that represented the project proposals.

For a time lapse movie on how the exhibition evolved please check our freshly initiated platform www.webalance.org.

This is part of summer 2010 advertising campaign of Magnum ice cream. And we thought that backing the currency with environmental value instead of gold, as explained in this scenario, was a crazy and wild idea…

Marketplaces of the 21st century are increasingly conscious, the information society provides more transparency. With this the demand for more ethical business processes and actions.

Nowadays we take for granted is that money produces interest, yet this is a relatively new phenomenon. Bernard Lietaer analyzes the problem of interest and makes the comparison with the growth of a tree:

“Interest on money constitutes one of the most systematic causes of our destruction of the global environment. Consider as metaphor, for example, the life of a tree (or any other living resource): Because of interest, the net present value of any income far away in the future is negligible. So, it literally pays to cut down a tree and put the proceeds in a savings account instead of letting it grow for another decade or century. Similarly, the only types of tree worth planting commercially are the fastest-growing varieties such as pine. (Nobody plants redwoods for commercial reasons.) So even when we plant trees, we are systematically losing biodiversity.“

Perhaps it is not for nothing that, for more than a thousand years, interest on money was prohibited and considered usury by all three major religions. Read more at Lietaers Community Currencies project.