Systemic insights into the heart of an earthbound economics

Hylke Bonnema — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 12:24:10 +0000

For my grandchilderen

I guided a very special constellation in The Hague the other day (november 2011). What made itself known was…., how important the next generations are in our policy forming. We could observe a deep change within the way we use the stock markets, the sudden change came, when the ‘pensionists’ moved their primary focus from the amount of interest on their stock portfolio’s to the welfare of their grandchilderen. This small shift can look like this. Many large investors in the stock market are through pension funds, this is about the height of return on investment in the short term, because people want to have as high as possible pension, right! Now when all these people start asking questions about what their money is being used for, and more importantly how is the impact of their investments on the welfare of the coming generations, their grandchilderen?

An other interesting dynamic was that we need to give up our moral higher idealistic causes to reconnect with the reality of economics, to return to a focus on the next generations, our children and their children and their children….

So this new way of reconnecting the heart of economy with the heart of the earth as the source for all children to be fed. After this present government which helps to make that transition. The new transition brought about by the new inspired Occupy movement and Arab spring brings about a new change a feminine motherly style of government with a clear foundation in earthbound economics and future generations.

Earth bound economics is a focus where exchange of goods for the best prices helps as many people as possible to be fed….economics is a way to become very efficient and effective in allocating our resources, so all can be fed.

As some Rabobank toppeople say: Rabobank feeding the next generation. By helping the best farmers to be even better, they can produce more for a better price and feed as many people as possible, without destroying our precious biodiversity that we need to have a sustainable earth, with plenty of good soil and forest for new medications.

Aligning finance and values

admin — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 07:43:57 +0000

The world is changing rapidly. The collapse of big banks, the Arab spring, the Occupy movement. What will be our answer?

Perhaps, reconnecting your finance to your values. Look at your stock portfolio in your pension plan Or look at where you store your money. Money talks and walks.

When we Dutch invented the stock market in the 16th century, we did that to make it possible for our trading ships to be financed by several people and with this we also disconnected their responsibility from the profits.

Nowadays many of us are only interested in the amount of profit, in the amount of pension, instead of looking deeper into where the money comes from. Do you stand behind the mission of the company you invested in? Or even bigger are you willing to invest in company’s with a lower profit, but who give more to the world in the long term?

This is difficult, because of course we are interested in the growth of our income. I think this also is important, don’t misunderstand me. However, I also believe we need to reconnect our heart with our mind in this. We need to reconnect finance with company values. Maybe even make stockholders liable for the mission of the company. In this way our grandchilderen’s world can bloom.