Adding monetary value to CO2
This is an overview of the carbon credit system as it was formalized in Kyoto (1997). The aim is to understand what we can learn from this system with respect to proposing an eco currency. Both try to introduce a non-material good into the financial market in order to keep it from being overrun by current economy.
The Ecosystem Marketplace, a project of Forest Trends, is a leading source of news, data, and analytics on markets and payments for ecosystem services (such as water quality, carbon sequestration, and biodiversity). We believe that by making accessible information on policy, finance, regulation, science, business, and other market-relevant factors, markets for ecosystem services will one day become a fundamental part of our economic system, helping give value to environmental services that, for too long, have been taken for granted.
Hans Rosling talks at TED about the difference about the way we think of the world and how it really is. He says that the traditional we (Western countries) and them (Third world countries) attitude is not a correct model of reality anymore.
Yochai Benkler explains using many examples emerging on the internet that collaboration is much stronger than traditional organizations. In an information economy in which we live, it’s a very powerful fact that almost anyone in this most advanced economy has a computer. Benkler argues that a computer is in fact the one most important building blocks in this economy, opening up the way to true collaboration in a what he calls ‘open source economics’.
In an article by the Dutch CPB (bureau for economic policy analysis) the application of the contingent value method is critically assessed for cost benefit analysis. They question whether nature and landscape values can be expressed in Euros. Although the method is widely used in assessing e.g. infrastructure projects, many critics remain.
A new way to view the world; ECO-mode, different areas tagged by amoebas
As nature is worth eco currency, there needs to be a system to assess the value of nature and to calculate how many eco’s nature is worth. A concept to truly and subjectively assess the value of nature is to use specially designed and grown amoebas.
Areas where high poverty and high population density coincides with high biodiversity may indicate areas in which poor people likely have no other choice than to unsustainably extract resources, in turn threatening biodiversity. © 2006 UNEP/GRID-Arendal
Some of the poorest countries are actually very rich in biodiversity. The current imbalance in tangible rewards for preserving the forrest versus cutting them down to harvest crops makes it unpreventable that valuable nature is lost in favor of economy.