20100607
Hi Dave,
I am very interested and determined to find a way to find synergy with your network. I would ask all in this network to consider supporting and also personally adopting and acting on DIY Food. This might mean that you can build a DIY Food project - that would be your: Back Yard Project, Family Farm Project or Community Based Project where you live - or you can help someone to build one of these projects. I, as the inventor especially need to walk this walk and I am determined to build a Back Yard Project. I can have a small space in the backyard that can use to "make the world a better place". So, there will be many people that find themselves in a similar situation - able to take the path of action if there is some help. With some help they can build low cost DIY and become equipped to Pay It Forward by teaching others. But before we can be teachers we must be doers.
I would like to see Sola Roof enabling family enterprise and community enterprise. Community enterprise is, by my definition, a social enterprise and these kinds of activity even though they are "for profit" are not in the same category of Agribusiness that defines the commercial food supply chain, which flows food through corporate retail chains to the largely urban consumer. I do hope to do business within this commercial sector and to license commercial business in the agriculture, aquaculture and architecture sectors - and this activity will be handled by my Life Synthesis group. This commercial arm is now getting established and I hope my ownership interest will one day be very profitable and provide substantial financial resources that I intend to contribute to help the development of the non-commercial Sola Roof activity, including research, educational and humanitarian Pay It Forward Projects.
However, up to this time the commercial investment I have made has yet to produce anything but debt for me and still is requiring investment to get through the start-up phase. Some say that I should wait for the commercial success and then initiate humanitarian activity. I say that it is important that they both proceed concurrently and that there is an urgency for fundamental educational action that has the purpose of proving that hope is justified; that solutions exist to the great crisis of the day; and that we can access and apply these solutions in our daily life. Food security in a vast number of homes and communities will prove to the majority of people (who are urban consumers) that exploitation by big business in terms of food price and food supply disruption is a manipulation that can be stopped and has practical answers that are also good for the planet. This is the disruptive power of the DIY Food campaign.
However, DIY Food is a non-commercial activity and we must look to how we teach and inspire people who able to put into practice the DIY Food solutions and to support their action when resources are lacking. It often is the case that sufficient money, land, skills, and personal time are not all on-hand at the same time for any one person, family or community. But if we can work in groups then we will see all the resources coming together and projects will be implemented that will inspire others to also take action. People with the DIY skills need to create a personal livelihood out growing and teaching others how to build DIY and grow your own food.
People with financial means should have the opportunity to apply their capital to enable those who have no money. These ethical investments should be recovered and the investor would have the choice of rolling over the investment into the next project. Even more dynamic is the Pay It Forward contribution of money to the DIY Food Challenge that always directs the financial surpluses from one Pay It Forward Project to next Pay It Forward Project. We can gradually eliminate unethical Debt Capital? and Capital Concentration? and develop Freedom Capital? and Distributed Wealth? - this new economic paradigm will inevitably eliminate the foundations of poverty and put an end to hunger and much human suffering. Our Pay It Forward humanitarian projects will enable poor and devastated communities to "build back better" on many levels. Build Back Better is the theme of assistance adopted by the Clinton Foundation for disaster relief work in Haiti.
What can you do to participate in the DIY Food Campaign I invite you to send me money to support me to establish the Campaign. One of the first steps for me will be to apply such financial support to the task of establishing the first DIY Food project - one Back Yard Project will be built at my home so that I can walk the walk and more effectively encourage others. Then we will encourage several other capable groups who have sufficient resources to join the DIY Food Campaign by building and teaching in their region. I also propose that we get organized to offer DIY Food cash grants for DI Yers, helping to kick off the Pay It Forward program, in a global "competition" in association with a world recognized NGO.
DI Yers who thus become active this summer will commit to collective support for Pay It Forward Projects starting with a project in Haiti that can be underway by the end of this summer. This would be an exemplar project that can kick-off the global Sola Roof humanitarian activity, which will be sustained by the Pay It Forwad contributions of all non-commercial users (voluntary) and the Honor Payment of our commercial users and DIY Kit suppliers who use the Sola Roof brand and support our DIY Food Challenge.
Please consider if you can personally provide some money, time or other resources (perhaps you and/or your organization can be one of the first of the DI Yers) now to enable me to launch this campaign and to build the first Back Yard Project. Also please share this message with anyone who you think would like to participate in DIY Food or assist the DIY Food Campaign. With your help and God's grace I will carry forward this vision and I pray we are all inspired to work together to BUILD a sustainable future for all.