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oneVillage Initiative Integrated Knowledge Wheel: Economy Pillar
 

Maximum and equal opportunities for individuals to be the creators and owners of common wealth.

Vision
We envision a global economic system that is highly integrated and makes effective use of ICT. The emphasis is on the development of local empowerment programs which encourage the development of a strong local self-identity combined with a global consciousness in relation to human as well as ecological considerations.

Current Reality and Challenges
Free Markets can be shown, under certain assumptions, to be the most efficient and fair method of setting uniform prices, making the best use of resources and encouraging economic growth. One of those assumptions is that every participant in the market has perfect information about everybody else in the market, and about everything offered for sale. Without that assumption, as economist Joseph Stiglitz points out, none of the advantages follow.

The Human Development Report 2003 shows women, the rural poor and ethnic minorities do not get their fair share of resources and progress in health care and development has much greater in cities than in rural regions. The economies of these countries are notoriously inefficient, and often corrupt. Resources are allocated extremely poorly, and most are greatly underused, while natural resources that can be extracted and sold by international corporations are greatly overused. The local population often not only fails to receive money for the resources in their lands, but often has negative economic results from resource extraction, including environmental degradation, disruption of their society and traditional economy, and other problems.

Wealth Inequality a Threat to Global Peace - The HDI reports that15% of the world's most affluent people consume 85% of the world's resources and that inequality is growing. Whether income inequality under globalization is increasing or decreasing is debated. Regardless it is clear that significant challenges remain in getting low income regions to the point where they sustain their people's basic needs.

Digital Divide - Those not in the information economy do not get world prices for their labor, agricultural produce, or other goods and services. As the impact of technology has become more obvious to many the issue of a Digital Divide between between haves and havenots became seen as a larger issue. The ICT for development has grown with people lead Allen Hammond of WRI and CK Prahalad leading the way. In countries like telecommunications has take off with the number of cells going from under a million to almost five million in five years. However the SANGONeT report on the Status of the Internet in Africa notes that "the differences between the development levels of Africa and the rest of the world are much wider in this area than they are using more traditional measures of development." According to the Digital Dividend:

Manhattan has more phones than sub-Saharan Africa;

More internet accounts in London than all of Africa;

80% of the world's population has never made a phone call;

Developed world one radio station per 30 thousand as compared to one per every 2 million in the developing world;

The net connects 100 million computers, but represents less than 2% of the world's population.

Approach
Those regions of the world that have been most successful have relied on a self-help approach. Other common attributes have been a strong sense of community and collective self-identity that allow people to discipline themselves to promote sacrifice and frugality so that savings rates remained high and investments were effectively allocated towards meaning investments that actually stimulated rapid economic development rather than conspicuous consumption of frivolous goods.

We feel it is necessary to involve all segments of society in the policymaking process and debate is essential. In order to ensure global stability a more equitable distribution of the benefits of growth in the global economy is necessary. Therefore to adequately address the income and the corresponding digital divide we find it is vital to buttress the WB’s objectives. We propose a framework more realistically to changes and challenges of the 21st century that:

Develops a package of consulting services for integration economy;

Offers Policy analysis advice to expand fair trade and sustainable human interactions through globalization;

Creates fair trading systems that ensure accountability and evaluation models that promote sustainable and encourage tax shifting strategies the minimize environmental and social risks to globalization.

Through the oneVillage Initiative, we link grassroots oriented programs together developing an global approach that effectively promotes best practices. The integrated approach links education, with training consulting, networking and financial assistance together so that OVF and its family of partners and affiliated organizations can provide one-stop shopping towards ecoliving solutions for bottom up economies.

The potential for growth is immense as disruptive technologies like open source SW, alternative energy, wireless and agricultural systems that integrate waste recovery and collection with energy and agricultural production.

Basic empowerment of the village economy creates wealth and credit that allows the village to purchase a variety of tools and equipment to leverage further growth, including more computers, and perhaps more bandwidth from the Internet into the village. The village school can be fully equipped, and used as a community center in the evenings.

With the right approach, the village economy could be a driver in moving more affluent regions towards sustainability. Careful consideration of the most effective strategy for integrating the below mentioned appropriate technologies and best practices is vital:

Workstations for synchronous telecooperation;

Electronic meeting and virtual participation rooms;

Modular building materials for lightweight building;

Toolmachines to realize open designs in all kind of materials;

Solar, biomass, hydroponic technologies.

Human and economic capital will focus not just on sustainability but also on developing export services to peripheral regions that add to the core values. These services will be a significant form of foreign exchange for sustainable communities. However, they will be secondary in priority to the core economy, which revolve around valued added goods produced from natural resources managed at the local level. The economic pump will involve the production of necessities like food, water and building materials as well as from consulting, education and tourism.

Goals:

Generate global interest in transferring technology;

Develop and deploy products, services, training methods and communications systems that facilitate sustainable development on a global scale;

Increase technology access to the emerging markets;

Promote triple bottom line sustainability that empowers grassroots economic development through an integrated whole systems approach.

 

Orgs in our "Economy Pillar Network"

Adapted Consulting - Focusing on ICT telecenter & network sustainability as well as cutting edge technology deployment

Good Cap Fund - Specializing in the funding of social enterprises

Ashoka Foundation - Global social enterprise training network

Natural Capitalism Institute - Founded by Green Biz leader Paul Hawken, the Natural Capitalism Institute, develops accountability tools to monitor socially conscious investing and web integration tools like WiserEarth.

Xigi.net - A networking tool for linking different social enterprise oriented groups.

Other Economy Social Enterprise Links

The Social Edge - An website organized by Skoll Foundation thats promotes innovation in the social enterprise sector.

Rudolf Steiner Foundation

Acumen Fund

Institute for Local Self-Reliance - provides resources to help promote sustainability from a community perspective.

Key Pillar Components

Natural Capitalism - explanation of a process to transition capitalism so that its linked to natural measures of value and sustainability.

Disruptive Technology - A technology so revolutionary it disrupts the existing order of business within particular sector.

Natural Step Process - process for reforming business to make it more sustainable.

Restorative Economy - Term coined by Paul Hawken referring to the process of rebuilding and rejuvenating degraded ecosystem.

Value-added Production - Value that comes from converting a commodity to a higher priced finished product and often used in relation to promote local economic empowerment.

OVF Ecology Pillar Projects

Jukwa Srowie Mixed Farmer's Coop - In Jukwa, Ghana, we have funded a process enabling the local farmers cooperative to secure a palm oil processing plant (still under construction). The focus for the next year is to develop integrated farming practices along with a small bio-diesel facility to utilize a portion of the palm oil produced for local energy needs. Future plans are to develop this facility into a center for sustainable agriculture.

Other Compelling Economy Pillar Stories

P2P Microfinance; the Kiva.org and Prosper.com Stories - In 2005 Kiva.org (means agreement in Swahili) was established. About the same time Prosper.com, began helping individuals loan each other small amounts. Both businesses are pioneers in microlending, a field born in the 1970s that is gaining prominence. Muhammad Yunus, of Grameen Bank fame in 1976, started the whole idea. Yunus recently won the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize for developing the idea of making small loans to entrepreneurs who otherwise might not be able to raise money.

Visionary Movers and Shakers

Dr Christopher Daughterty - Founded Essential Living Foods and BeOn Holdings and is now pioneering a sustainable development model that "goes beyond Fair Trade."

Relevant Research

UNDP Annual Human Development Reports - Rich source of data on income inequality.

Millennium Indicators Database

World Bank

Bottom-Up Economy

 
                 
 

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