Financial Permaculture

From Open Digital Village Wiki

Financial permaculture is “the financial engine to replicate sustainable systems". This is based on an alternative trust-based property-ownership model that investors can buy into. The idea is that the management of the trust guided by socially conscious principles will develop a process that ensures both a decent return for investors and that the trust remains for future generations.

Bill Mollison, one of the founders of the [permaculture] movement, says that an important aspect of permaculture is to ground it on feasible and also replicable economic models. This means arranging things financially so that these new ecologically conscious models of living can spread rapidly, transforming ecologically degraded landscapes into ecological prosperous developments. Financial permaculture puts people with common values and needs together so that they can help each other to realize their dreams--right livelihood.

A key ingredient in making sustainability economically feasible is to take advantage of wasteful behaviors that are a common element of contemporary society, and to develop better designed systems that save people money:

1. Convert what this society sees as waste materials into useful resources. For example: reprocessing such materials in an industrial ecology geared to operate in a highly efficient and cost effective way.
2. Develop methodologies for making the land productive again that rapidly bring the land back to life. If we can make degraded undervalued lands productive then we develop a financial engine to propel sustainable development as an alternative to existing practices.
3. Use real estate strategies such as notes in innovative ways to lock in the value of sustainable products and services based on guaranteed future asset value including accrued gains such as the power produced by a solar panel or the lumber produced by a property.
4. Carbon trading schemes are a key component because they allow companies that are making a commitment to reducing pollution to fund more sustainable projects.
5. Sustainable business involves not only renewables and industrial ecologies but also getting companies that produce locally-produced products that consider the needs of people and the environment--lamps, candles, furniture etc—into the mix.
6. Create systems that make it easier for people to help and empower themselves through the development of self-organizing systems. If we work together to build environments that improve the quality of our lives from an integrated live/work/leisure perspective—then we will not only be happier people but we will also be more effective at making a difference in the world.