I am going to talk about 2 things: 1) a social banking system (blockchain based), why it’s needed, urgent and what to do now; 2) a social currency (location based) to fill the gap of value transfer between hard cash and just honor and recognition for volunteering.
Why do we need a social alternative to the current banking platform?
To stop the depletion of the Earth’s natural resources as is happening due to prevalent system of money creation through loans with interest, which drives (unsustainable?) Growth.
To fight global poverty by facilitating cross-border micro payments and allow the unbanked (no ID needed) access to the money economy if a mobile is available.
To be able to reward volunteers, activists and climate smart farmers with a social currency for their (carbon) positive impact. To manage the platform as a reality play by gamers would be most attractive.
To soften the blow to the poor during the next Crash by offering a positive alternative. See you tube Prof B Litaer
To allow all social enterprises and groups to share the benefits of the platform and build a parallel economy together.
A social Coin is needed:
To stimulate local economies, to the benefit of the poorest producers
To be able to reward (debt free, cross border) those who help to reach a sustainable world
To enable issuing of debt free loans and insurances and simplify procedures
To enable international project cooperation and trade
By grading and certifying all projects against sustainable ppp criteria, is good for the climate
Empowering all marginal groups by opening new venues of income and cooperation.
As an intermedium, a currency facilitating exchange from game points to hard cash.
The GooD Bank, software for a better world, in 7 tweets:
Let’s embark on a far reaching endeavor: to build sustainable and democratic banking software on an Innovative (Blockchain & GIS) Platform.
We design software, including sets of protocols and functions that makes it work pro-poor (income generating) and pro-planet.
We design a social banking platform, offering a choice of currencies, coins, points, scores, levels, certifications, skill & reputation.
We design a social bank for value transfer and creation opening a Middle Path between existing $ system and the unpaid, voluntary care.
We design an alternative on-line platform, blockchain based, location based,
open for all #socent to use, operating cross-borders or locally.
We will design a gamified platform, with protocols such that it can be managed and monitored by players, even project design by the crowd.
We design the software needed by 
I like to introduce you to the thinking and action the Tree Credits group has done the last 7 years. We designed a solution to address Climate Change and Global Poverty as a single issue.
To pretend to be able to solve these global problems sounds utopian, but the methods to get the carbon back into the soil (and so lower CO2 concentration in the atmosphere) are well known (think agroforestry, eco farming) and with our revolutionary social banking software, for which we have the design ready, it might well get implemented.
Please, feel free to become a patron and to help us in our quest to find the right entrepreneur, the next Mark Zuckerberg, to carry this project along.
Interested? Send me a mail. Ferdinand Swart. srifer@gmail.com
I’m a design engineer (TUDelft), with a background in community development and microfinance, since 1990 company director (SriToys export of wooden, handcrafted toys), Now-a-days I specialize in Project Design, projects to tackle climate change and poverty as one interconnected issue to be addressed most urgently. Therefore I started Tree-Credits.org in 2009: to provide a universal basic income to those who possitively impact the global climate.
It is from here that my interest in banking arises - how to send micro payments to the rural poor for climate care, crossing all borders.
I am not a complete novice to alternative banking. In the 1980s I worked in village enterprise development and was part of a group that also included M. Yunus (pioneer of microfinance) that introduced microfinance in Sri Lanka.
More recently, I have been thoroughly studying the history of local currencies (STRO) and the working of the Cyclos software. This taught me new functions that can be built into the software to ensure that the community and the relatively poor profit. Recently I followed an open university course in Gamification, since we believe that the “crowd” could be motivated to manage the full system, but only if is presented as a game. Lately I read hundreds of articles on Fintech developments, see links at the end of this article.
We need a new banking system, an open financial protocol for digital value transfer, that is pro-poor and pro-climate; sustainable, transparent and democratic. An alternative system to complement the actual dominant, reckless, financial system, which by the manner in which new money is created (as interest bearing loans) is biased - pro-rich and anti-poor - as it is pro-growth and anti-environment/ climate.
The free “Good” Bank Software will create a platform that could help any innovative (#SocEnt #Fintech) company to function in a sustainable way. To achieve this each sector (educational, development and land use related. etc.) should develop an app to run it on this platform, which is hard wired to the benefit of the poor and to cool the global climate.
We need a platform on which many shades of exchange units could be run, kinds of currency in between the commercially valued systems and free gifts, voluntary work, like caring for family, to complement these two existing exchange systems. We need all kinds of “social money” from a currency with a social function to gifts with some compensation. These alternatives will also be needed to deflate the pressure to build into the existing system and cushion the effects of next crash for the poor (see Prof. Bernard Lietaer).
Besides we propose a unifying Coin and we will work hard to build a circular economy around it, trading online as well as locally by mobile banking, with the main aim to strengthen rural communities, women and girls.
We plan to design truly social, sustainable and democratic banking software, based on a distributed platform, like Nxt.org.
The Need for the Goood Bank and Goood Coin:
Need 1 Pro-poor Fintech is needed to stimulate global equality
Need 2 Pro-Climate money creation is needed to safeguard the last carbon stores
Need 3 Public demands change. The public opinion is strongly demanding alternatives for the existing banking system, it became an issue to win election on!
Need 4 Top economics plead for additional money system to safe the global economy in peril.
Having spent most of the last 3 decades in Sri Lanka, I have encountered numerous scenarios where a strong need was felt to have an innovative bank.
Tree Credits; for our TC projects we have to send monthly micropayments to a large number of children and women in India and Kenya. Payments for growing trees and other climate services. We have to register all participants also and issue micro loans and insurance and set up a village investment fund.
A group of artists and craftsmen of the Good Market, Colombo, wanted to sell their produce through Etsy.com, and divide the money based on the time spend, but they even could not open bank account to receive money, let alone administer this scheme.
Same for a group of educated youth who wanted earn some cash through affiliate marketing on their computers, but lost 50% to middlemen, because no foreign currency bank account could be opened.
And there are numerous other examples where the poor lose out because of lack of access to banking facilities or other services. We will try to work around all existing systems, including most NGOs and go direct to the base.
The latest trends point to the demise of the middlemen. Travel agents, taxis, hotels even banks and universities are forced to reinvent themselves as their services are now getting organized online. All gets fluid as we get empowered as individuals to deal directly with service provider (but within strict protocols) even if she or he is abroad.
Elements of “Good” banking software
The form of the proposed software should be an open platform and 3rd parties will be invited to build their app on it. A platform suitable for all (cross-border, sustainable) activities involving people and exchange of money.
There are 6 basic bank functions, I use them to list the innovations needed:
Payments
Deposit & lending
Capital raising
Market analyses
Investment management
Insurance
Payments
1.1 The software will be suitable (mainly) for online banking and mobile phone banking.
1.2 All banking and identification functions will will use a blockchain distributed ledger method
1.3 The platform will facilitate various kinds of local and global newly created (crypto) currencies
1.4 Local currencies, if well circulated can have a positive social impact on the local economy; use Cyclos as example of social banking software
1.5 A location (GIS) based currency (Tree Coins) would be good to validate climate positive locations.
1.6 An internal currency or point system is needed to be used as intermediary between hard currencies and local used ones.
1.7 The platform should allow the use of various point systems, such as “ether” used to reward/pay for the computers used to run the distributed blockchain
1.8 Volunteers (called players) can earn points for all positive activities. Having a sustained impact might result in eaning shares
- Deposit & lending
2.1 Make deposit banking possible (no risk, no reinvestment, no interest)
2.2 Enable local currencies with no interest loans (only costs will be charged) to further sustainability. Also make rewards for the use of the currency and penalties for prolonged non-use possible.
2.3 Enable loans to be underwritten by pier groups.
2.4 All loans should be rated by PPP (people, planet, profit) criteria
2.5 All lenders and others involved will be rated for reputation (such as: integrity/ track record, seniority, skills & knowledge)
2.6 Enable blockchain based credit/ debit cards
3 Capital raising
3.1 Crowdfunding is the centerpiece in all its variations, so several templates are needed.
3.2 Provide protocols to enable various kinds of fundraising by the crowd, crowd acquisition, crowdmarketing, crowdraising.
3.3 Provide protocols how to do crowd public relations and other promotional activities.
4 Market analyses
4.1 Enable PPP analyses of sectors, countries, processes and companies
4.2 Enable setting up (bio/organic, ppp, safety) certification systems and (5 levels of) control.
4.3 Provide for protocols how to improve PPP performance of ventures
4.4 Provide for protocols for start-ups how to organize and incorporate
4.5 Enable location (GPS) based climate (or PPP) ratings to pinpoint carbon positive interventions.
5 Investment management
5.1 Provide for protocols for project design by the community with help of the crowd.
5.2 Enable GPS based information collection (village Wiki) and blockchain based land registry.
5.3 Provide for protocols for long term investment in timber trees, land, eco tourism, water supply and improved cooking devices.
5.4 Enable social/ climate investment schemes like Tree-Credits.org
5.5 Make crowd investment management possible, not only like with crowdfunding: vote with your wallet, but provide the protocols how to self manage the whole process.
5.6 Provide for protocols how to check PPP scores and reputation by the crowd.
6 Insurance
6.1 Enable insurance in a variety of valuta and point systems.
6.2 Enable GPS based landscape insurance for climate services like growing trees.
7 Security is paramount in a complex banking system and will have many levels:
7.1 Employ all the inherent safe properties of the blockchain for basic system security.
7.2 Employ all the standard bank safety features as far is needed
7.3 Allow for peer control at a local as well as global level to further security
7.4 Provide for protocols for geo-specialists to explore and check geo data against the latest satellite images.
7.5 Invite IT specialists with high reputation scores (Good hackers) to probe weak point and propose repairs.
7.6 Invite top specialists/ generalists with highest reputation (Good wizards) to take a helicopter view on the general functioning to spot unusual activity.
Summery
Blockchain technology allows for banking without banks. There are no regulators yet.
To steer it into sustainable & social & democratic direction, our platform should have an array of unique features, like its own currencies and rewards systems, a host of exchanges between various shades of currencies and points, in-house eco- and PPP-certification to make the platform “social”; in-house crowd management, crowd-monitoring and crowd-design, all game compatible will help to keep all this manageable. Its flexibility and independence will facilitate cross-border exchanges, to reach all who are somehow connected online, even if without ID, directly and without any middlemen, at extremely low costs. Local governments and NGOs will be welcomed into ad hoc coalitions.
Social Platform, the Good Game:
To run such a complex platform and to make it much more attractive to join as a volunteer we plan to run it as a Game with various point systems, levels and challenges. If the game points can be monetized participating will be even more attractive, but most important is the real and positive impact an individual players can have, thus giving meaning to one's life. Inviting the crowd to run the whole “bank” should make the platform democratic, like crowdfunding makes investment funding democratic.
Alternative for Banks, INGO’s, Cert’s
A main goal of the platform is to offer an alternative to some failing transnational structures such as banks, international development aid and certification. These kind of cross border activities are attracting the corrupt and organized crime and are in need of many layers of bureaucracy, causing an arms race of crime and control. We propose a less time consuming and more positive way, a more flexible platform, tailor made for good willing social enterprises, with multiple layers of control, using the latest apps. We count on openness, on peer control, on crowd control and on the blockchain technology to build a sustainable global community of trust.
All this software is on my wishlist, now I like to show you where it could be used for:
Proposed Good or Tree Coin
Nowadays, creating a Social Coin appears to be a popular undertaking. Our software venture should start with some urgency, to claim a name (still to be decided), to start building a following and to test the concept, as outlined below.
Coin 1: Concept
The Coin could be based on the value of “carbon positive” location, the social and “climate” value of an location; is the place beneficial to the global as well as local climate, like food forests or eco-farms are?
The Coin could serve 2 functions: 1) as a social currency to pay volunteers and climate carers for their positive impact, cross border 2) as ready to use local currency.
It could function in parallel with existing currencies, to fill holes in the financial system, wherever needed.
The Coin could have 3 forms: as mobile phone credit (national), as cryptocurrency (international) or as local paper money. Agreements with phone companies will be necessary.
Coin 2: Intrinsic value: location and carbon positive land use.
Each Coin could be underwritten by a GIS location where carbon positive climate measures are being taken, such as trees growing/ food forests/ organic agr./ parks/ cycle paths/ green roofs/ urban gardens/ solar panels.
The location only gives its number (GIS) to the coin, so can always be traced back. However the coin can be freely circulated and the value is not related to the original location.
Land use can be carbon positive or carbon negative. If land use projects are excellent, more than average, other schemes might chip and offer more benefits.
Plot out all these in one meter by one meter blocks, their GIS reading = 1 Coin; GPS location is label of coin (or cent of coin). So 1 km of restored land or agroforestry might underwrite 1 Mn Coins.
So the total of Coins will be limited to the amount of land restored or still in tact; together good for about 2 x 10*13 Coins.
Virgin forests, preferable if controlled by the indigenous people themselves, qualify for coins issue, also for a reserve fund for future issue and remittances can be put in location specific fund to help defend its conservation.
All kind of climate positive projects may apply and we may start with all Tree Credits related projects: JP, Roeland, Paul, Willie Smit, Shanthe, Baka etc.
These parties or individuals might receive part of the allocated Coins, a percentage depending on the situation and phase of the project.
Coin 3: Creation and bringing into Circulation,
Coin creating is done by register carbon positive locations (with photo!) through special app. We reward climate-&-community-smart land-use.
This way of Coin creation is meant to limit the total quantity of the Coin available for circulation .
Once the Coin are created by identifying a location as being carbon positive the coin can be brought in circulation. There will be a reserve fund.
Parts of these newly created coins will be shared by the carer (of the climate positive landscape) and all those who helped to organize it; or they might be kept in reserve.
Ways to bring Coins into circulation include: 1) monthly payments to land carers (see TreeCredits), 2) signup bonuses for new members, 3) all real transactions, paid for by Coins 4) other climate positive actions with real impact, think publicity, fund raising, management, education, etc. (see theGoodGame)
Coin 4: Local economy
Besides creating an cross border tool, a major goal of the coin is to provide a ready made template to create a local currency and if it get widely circulated, might greatly stimulate the local economy to the benefit of poor, women, children.
Living in a remote village there should be possibilities to get Coins, like: 1) sign up to Coin- or Tree Credits scheme; 2) bonus for registration of a carbon positive location; 3) as monthly reward for landcare 4) as small loans; 5) as insurance pay 6) for volunteering online; 7) for organising local projects etc.
Sectors suitable to pay with local Coins include schools, local produce and products, eating houses and bakeries, hotels, services and some national products.
Shops should be stimulated to accept the Coin by offering them bonuses and small interest free loans, if they advertise a “Coin accepted” sign.
Small objects should be available online like smart phones, solar panels and seeds.
To safeguard the circulation of a “local” coin all parties involved should balance income and expenses. Especially if used crossborder we should be sure the Coin doesn’t get stuck at one side, location or sector.
Coin 5: Transaction Fees, how to stimulate local economy
Each transaction might carry two small fees, one half is for the computer costs, the other half goes toward the land carer.
To stimulate its use each transaction of the coin will result in the creation of new coins to compensate for transaction fees + bonus.
Hoarding the coin will be discouraged by charging monthly negative interest.
In all there might be 3 mechanisms to stimulate circulation and thus the local economy and income: 1) conditions for exchange 2) negative monthly interest 3) bonus new shares, given for transaction for goods and services.
Coin 6: Exchange into other currency, a pro-income scenario:
There will be a coin exchange and the coins can be changed under specific conditions. There are 2 major conditions: 1) how often used in a transaction 2) time passed since last transaction or issuing time. For instance the rule might apply that the coin can be exchange for local cash only a week after it is used once. This to guarantee the teacher or shopkeepers the value of the coin but still stimulate its frequent use.
If time and/ or usage restrictions for exchange apply, there will be 2 kinds of (digital) Coins: Coins which can be exchanged and Coins that can not. Accordingly your Coin account might show 2 separate amounts.
Starting communities might have a circulation restrictions of only one usage, but in mature setting, where most shops and even local officials except the Coin this could rise to seven times using.
In this case, after 7 transactions your account will show the amount of the smallest transaction as exchangeable and with every new transaction the next lowest amount will be added.
The international Exchange Rates (including conditions) could be set by a Coin’s Board against a basket of World Currencies; considering longer term market development projections as well. This to keep the value stable.
Local circumstances will call for tailor made rules of exchange for which we might provide protocols, how to design and start a village exchange.
Coin 7: Some History: A common currency that works (unlike the Euro)
During the second world war Keynes developed a system of international money issued by a global bank, the ICU (international clearing union) to conduct international trade. If a country exported some its ICU saldo went up, if the country imported some, it went down. To balance the system he proposed each country had a limit how much it could go in the red, where after it had to devalue its currency to make their exports more attractive. And they had to pay interest; but also the surplus countries had to pay 5-10% interest on their surplus to stimulate them into importing. So everybody would be interested to balance its trade.
We will use these principles to run any local currency.
Financing of this software making project:
Money is available a plenty for large Fintech projects like this, the question is more: who will have the power and who will steer it in the right pro-poor way?
Our software makers have convinced us that working open source and offering the results for free is the way of the future and the way to go ahead.
Then how to earn an income from the platform and how to interest investors to take part?
The growth potential of the platform promises to be impressive, especially with an own coin, if used platform wide with a steadily growing economy, which will mean growing income. Also gamification will help to generate a lot of traffic.
Once the platform gets operational, those who build it could find enough consultancy work to and help 3rd parties design apps for the distributed platform.
Parties might be interested to invest in the software development if we offer them some kind of exclusivity, like first use and a tailor made app for f.i. Retail bank, Investment bank/ crowdfunding, Insurance company/ Outsourcing and Affiliate Marketing/ art & craft trade, eco tourism (investment), solar PV investment bank, timber growing, land bank and registry, certification, global education. Parties who are ready for a new beginning in the new economy are invited to join.
Enterprises could be interested to use the platform and the same cross-border points/ currencies facilities to build a strong parallel economy together.
TreeCredits has plans to finance (and even build) the software ourselves, especially the part we need most. To be financed by contracting large tree planting schemes (in Ethiopia and/ or Kenya) and reserving part of the OH costs for making the software. However since the transition is urgent, better to finance the work ahead by a coalition of supporters, even by crowdfunding. The stumbling block here might be the complexity of narrative.
To stay independent, we prefer non-American (FINTECH) partners, since we are wary of the US government, who routinely blocks all perceived competition to the dollar as the world’s reserve currency.
For now we will operate under Tree Credits Foundation, a tax deductible charity aiming to impact poverty and climate change. We are looking for Patrons and Trustees to help us with our search to find the right executives and finances.
Some more articles I consulted recently:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jan/24/blockchain-bitcoin-technology-most-important-tech-invention-of-our-age-sir-mark-walport
https://openbankproject.com
http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_The_future__of_financial_services.pdf
http://bitcoinagile.com/62B4CF/bitland-blockchain-initiative-seeks-to-create-reliable-lan-titles-in-africa-ccn-financial-bitcoin-cryptocurrency-news_stream
http://cointelegraph.com/news/saving-the-world-through-crypto-the-humanitarian-blockchainT
http://www.socialtrade.nl/?lang=en http://www.cyclos.org/
http://www.forbes.com/sites/rogeraitken/2016/04/05/bitlands-african-blockchain-initiative-putting-land-on-the-ledger/#28f9f61c1029
http://www.forbes.com/sites/ashoka/2014/03/25/stock-exchanges-for-social-enterprises-heres-why-we-need-them/#51ae11e17b8d
http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2014/dec/04/could-islamic-finance-solution-capitalism?CMP=share_btn_tw
http://www.gmanetwork.com/news/story/391302/scitech/science/developing-world-may-need-annual-500b-for-climate-by-2050-un
http://www.paulpolak.com/is-it-wrong-for-business-to-profit-from-the-poor/ Also our target: 2 Trillion Trees
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2014-11-19/two-trillion-trees-to-save-the-world http://peoplefoodandnature.org/blog/seeing-the-water-basins-for-the-trees/
https://www.rockefellerfoundation.org/blog/business-social-responsibility/?utm_source=Social%20Media&utm_medium=Twitter&utm_campaign=RF%20Blog
http://chrisblattman.com/2015/06/25/dear-governments-and-aid-agencies-please-stop-hurting-poor-people-with-your-skills-training-programs/
http://www.geo.coop/content/reflections-fagor
http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/microcredit-no-panacea-for-poverty-study/article6818987.ece
http://www.microfinancegateway.org/library/designing-successful-distribution-strategies-digital-money http://www.fao.org/family-farming/en/
A Secret Weapon to Fight #ClimateChange: DIRT! http://wapo.st/1PHICMC
http://www.theecologist.org/essays/2986268/climatesmart_agriculture__preparing_for_a_corporate_soil_and_climategrab_in_paris.html
http://www.cbsnews.com/videos/the-future-of-money/
https://www.academia.edu/9858639/Lewis_Mumford_Civic_Environmentalism_and_Ecological_Regionalism
http://cointelegraph.com/news/bitcoin-transcends-borders-creates-truly-global-economy http://szabo.best.vwh.net/micropayments.html