At any single time, 1st World investment managers handle $150 trillion in bank savings, stocks and bonds and other financial instruments. Theoretically a mere 20% of the mammoth amount if invested in new 3rd World companies will employ all the world’s bottom poor. Unfortunately no such thing happens. The few thousand handlers of the gargantuan capital use around $1.4 trillion each day ‘gambling’ in the rise and fall of currencies. Concurrently, over $500 billion yearly go to stock and bond speculation. From 1992 to 1998, just 12 First World companies lost $25 billion betting on the rise and fall in the prices of oil, commodities, and interest rates. Obviously capital 'gambled away' in casino-style stock markets produce no new wealth. Old wealth simply transfer from losers to winners.
So why do investment managers 'gamble' hard-earned moneys entrusted to them by the world's companies? Main reason is the scarcity of companies that give good returns to capital. According to studies, the largest companies in the 1st World get up to 75% of 'new capital' out of profitable operations, not from the stock markets. For their part, investment managers are so scared of making bad investments that they dedicate just 1-3% of billion-dollar funds in startups.
In the 1980s many of such small startups eventually became billion-dollar corporations. The many concurrent failures however got more media attention, for the 'top courageous' startup financier M. Milken was jailed for supposed fraud, a victim of ambitious politicians. However Milken has been hailed by many people as a hero because he started a culture of selling stock shares and bonds to ordinary US employees. To date, the culture has enabled half of US families to become major shareholders in over half of US companies. Small startup companies taken together created a lot more jobs than the old majors. Investment courage enriched the US masses.
Our anti-poverty lesson thereby becomes obvious: why not jack up 1st World investment courage and use a major percentage of 'gambling capital' towards building new world-scale companies in the 3rd World? Since private investment managers won't do it, world governments have to step in. It takes just two laws to redeem the 3rd World poor this way, and at good profit to redeemers. 3rd World governments pass a Loans for Mass Entrepreneurship (LME) law. An LME law channels a major portion of yearly state budget towards lending to thousand-employee groups that set up joint ventures with 1st World corporations. Concurrently, 1st World governments pass an Expand World Markets (EWM) law. An EWM law dedicates a major portion of yearly state budgets plus 5-10% of investment companies' funds towards lending to 3rd World joint ventures arising from LME laws.
What happens next may be a matter of course. Since laws are forever unless repealed, the twin laws will routinely build thousands of joint venture companies and create millions of jobs for 3rd World poor every year, for all eternity. Trillions of dollars in repaid LME/EWM loans (becoming stock shares) plus dividend issues build fortunes in the hands of 3rd World employee masses. The new 3rd World joint ventures should learn to conduct joint planning to avoid market overcrowding that bankrupts industries and creates investment scares. A high percentage of resultant successes builds and cements the investment trust that channels increasingly larger portions of the world's over $150 trillion in investment capital. Stock market 'gambling' that at times results to trillion-dollar destruction of wealth held by investing publics tones down.
Now for the critical question: who persuades world governments to pass the twin laws? At this stage, only blogging nets have the worldwide reach to do it, initially by popularizing the 'sideline income' dream among two billion non-blogging employees worldwide.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Capitalism, Socialism, Populism: Which is Best?
Capitalism means varying degrees of rule by the oligarchy and the wealthy classes. Socialism is rule by the state bureaucracy. Both can benefit or scourge the masses depending on the character of the rulers. Populism is direct rule by the populace thru the internet, and currently it does not exist.
If the populace indeed rules, what happens? First the skilled masses (employees) will determine programs and laws, so state funds, assets and credit-worthiness get to be used for mass benefit. Second, employee masses all need ‘sideline income,’ so they will tend to use state assets towards formation and expansion of world-scale companies that are owned by thousand-employee entrepreneurial groups. Corporate formation translates to creation of jobs for bottom poor. Third, good laws are perpetual, so corporate formation and job-creation goes on forever, eventually employing all the populist society’s poor. Employee ownership of companies also means profit dividends and stock shares worth trillions of dollars perpetually flowing among the masses instead of bottling up within the tiny oligarchy as in capitalist societies. As one may see, what capitalism and socialism failed to do (democratize wealth and political power), populism have the potential to attain.
But what are the seeds of populism? Potentially, they already exist in the form of blogger nets. Bloggers already democratize information. By simply spreading populist ideals worldwide, they can eventually redeem all the world’s poor while acquiring stock shares and dividend incomes for themselves.
If the populace indeed rules, what happens? First the skilled masses (employees) will determine programs and laws, so state funds, assets and credit-worthiness get to be used for mass benefit. Second, employee masses all need ‘sideline income,’ so they will tend to use state assets towards formation and expansion of world-scale companies that are owned by thousand-employee entrepreneurial groups. Corporate formation translates to creation of jobs for bottom poor. Third, good laws are perpetual, so corporate formation and job-creation goes on forever, eventually employing all the populist society’s poor. Employee ownership of companies also means profit dividends and stock shares worth trillions of dollars perpetually flowing among the masses instead of bottling up within the tiny oligarchy as in capitalist societies. As one may see, what capitalism and socialism failed to do (democratize wealth and political power), populism have the potential to attain.
But what are the seeds of populism? Potentially, they already exist in the form of blogger nets. Bloggers already democratize information. By simply spreading populist ideals worldwide, they can eventually redeem all the world’s poor while acquiring stock shares and dividend incomes for themselves.
Monday, February 8, 2010
Networking As Anti-poverty Strategy
Networking is a subject not taught in Philippine schools, yet it is the essence of successful business and is a highly effective way towards mass wealth. Teaching Networking success stories and building a networking culture from High School up can be effective ways to minimize competitive tensions among students while building a ‘mass’ of future graduates mostly oriented towards building ‘mass’ wealth. Case examples:
(1) High School teachers encourage all students to join or form as many school-approved clubs and associations inside and outside the campus as schedules permit. This builds important social skills and a habit of making and keeping friends. The advantages of networking especially as future road to wealth have to be stressed in appropriate school subjects. ‘Networking for future wealth’ becoming part of students’ sub-conscious mind quenches bullying tendencies, develops cooperation instead of competition, and builds a team-building habit. The culture can build a ‘world-scale business’ view thru study of societies, companies, innovators’ biographies, research and development systems, and international marketing strategies that all created wealth thru local and international networking. Such business models can become powerful motivators for building a culture of entrepreneurship among students. Students must be made aware that after High School and College, old friendships are most helpful in getting jobs, building professional networks, joining political organizations to access state programs that lend capital to employee groups, and forming new companies with thousands of employees for ‘sideline income,’ thru use of state loans as capital.
(2) University teachers require all students to form innovation teams in their area of scientific interest. Fundamentally, Philippine science universities must develop a specialization culture coupled with an inventions requirement and subjects on commercializing and marketing of technologies. No student must be allowed to graduate unless he has invented and licensed at least five technologies, with or without a team. This is not as difficult as it sounds. The US Patent Office alone has over six million technologies on file that students may access to produce improvements or derivations based on international market needs. This culture requires State to set up laboratories for hire in every scientific area. The labs have to include prototype-making facilities. All labs have to be managed by scientific associations to avoid political corruption. The innovation culture also requires state to pass laws that grant entrepreneurship loans to thousand-employee groups that set up companies to translate inventions into commercial products that sell worldwide. An endless flow of new technologies from universities and research labs coupled with endless capital formation thru the state financing law assures perpetual creation of new companies and new jobs for bottom poor. Under such conditions, student teams with five or more inventions become millionaires thru corporate licensing, franchising and royalty income. The camaraderie of long and productive team research develops a habit of invention among the masses, making post-graduate teams ‘perpetual inventors.’ Such habit makes sure all redeemed poor never revert to poverty because there are always new products and services available to companies when old industries' markets become saturated.
Currently, these cultures do not exist in the Philippines and the rest of the 3rd World. Consequently no inventions emanate from 3rd World masses and few local-technology 3rd World companies have made it to world-class status. 3rd World companies are typically mere sellers of 1st World products in local markets, or assemblers of imported components for sale to tiny local markets. Result: micro-scale production and sales, few jobs, small profits, subsistence-level salaries, or in short, mass poverty. The imperative thereby becomes clear. If 3rd World peoples want to rise to the 1st World, they have to develop several critical cultures: (1) thousand-employee entrepreneurship thru state loans; (2) scientific specialization; (3) student team invention and innovation, and (4) development of a networking culture from school age and onwards till death amid wealth.
(1) High School teachers encourage all students to join or form as many school-approved clubs and associations inside and outside the campus as schedules permit. This builds important social skills and a habit of making and keeping friends. The advantages of networking especially as future road to wealth have to be stressed in appropriate school subjects. ‘Networking for future wealth’ becoming part of students’ sub-conscious mind quenches bullying tendencies, develops cooperation instead of competition, and builds a team-building habit. The culture can build a ‘world-scale business’ view thru study of societies, companies, innovators’ biographies, research and development systems, and international marketing strategies that all created wealth thru local and international networking. Such business models can become powerful motivators for building a culture of entrepreneurship among students. Students must be made aware that after High School and College, old friendships are most helpful in getting jobs, building professional networks, joining political organizations to access state programs that lend capital to employee groups, and forming new companies with thousands of employees for ‘sideline income,’ thru use of state loans as capital.
(2) University teachers require all students to form innovation teams in their area of scientific interest. Fundamentally, Philippine science universities must develop a specialization culture coupled with an inventions requirement and subjects on commercializing and marketing of technologies. No student must be allowed to graduate unless he has invented and licensed at least five technologies, with or without a team. This is not as difficult as it sounds. The US Patent Office alone has over six million technologies on file that students may access to produce improvements or derivations based on international market needs. This culture requires State to set up laboratories for hire in every scientific area. The labs have to include prototype-making facilities. All labs have to be managed by scientific associations to avoid political corruption. The innovation culture also requires state to pass laws that grant entrepreneurship loans to thousand-employee groups that set up companies to translate inventions into commercial products that sell worldwide. An endless flow of new technologies from universities and research labs coupled with endless capital formation thru the state financing law assures perpetual creation of new companies and new jobs for bottom poor. Under such conditions, student teams with five or more inventions become millionaires thru corporate licensing, franchising and royalty income. The camaraderie of long and productive team research develops a habit of invention among the masses, making post-graduate teams ‘perpetual inventors.’ Such habit makes sure all redeemed poor never revert to poverty because there are always new products and services available to companies when old industries' markets become saturated.
Currently, these cultures do not exist in the Philippines and the rest of the 3rd World. Consequently no inventions emanate from 3rd World masses and few local-technology 3rd World companies have made it to world-class status. 3rd World companies are typically mere sellers of 1st World products in local markets, or assemblers of imported components for sale to tiny local markets. Result: micro-scale production and sales, few jobs, small profits, subsistence-level salaries, or in short, mass poverty. The imperative thereby becomes clear. If 3rd World peoples want to rise to the 1st World, they have to develop several critical cultures: (1) thousand-employee entrepreneurship thru state loans; (2) scientific specialization; (3) student team invention and innovation, and (4) development of a networking culture from school age and onwards till death amid wealth.
Sunday, February 7, 2010
Anti-poverty Weapon: The Confucian Concept of Family
Kung Fu Tzu (Confucius) of ancient China collated his time’s prevalent relational culture as follows: The family first. Then comes the clan, the clan’s social network, the tribe, the village. All are one’s own families. Last comes the state which is everybody’s family, with the emperor as father. In dealing with all these families, one has to work for social harmony at all times, for harmony redounds to common good. To attain social harmony, everyone has to know his place and his limitations within his organizations and within society. The focus must be on Duty, not on Rights. The common good must always prevail over individual benefit.
From 1860s when Confucian Japan began to adopt Western-style corporations as weapons against poverty and industrial backwardness, Kung Fu Tzu’s culture asserted itself. The Japanese corporation became ‘family.’ Whenever possible, the biggest Japanese companies took in employees for life and showered them with benefits as the ‘corporate children.’ The gaps in salaries between ranks and between managers and their worker teams were not wide. Workers performed as teams, their managers as true ‘big brothers’ evidenced by their willingness to accept such small differences in pay between ranks. Managers and workers routinely studied production systems and made suggestions on improvements without expecting ‘instant reward.’ Reward came for everyone thru improved sales, profits, and bonuses that at times were given four times a year. The various hierarchies of line-level and managerial teams constantly searched for improvements in product quality, production process, world-scale marketing, building of corporate groups, and planning with state ‘fathers’ for conquest of world markets. The entire Japanese employee population became one ‘family’ struggling against 1st World economies in competitive business.
One sees the effects of this Confucian culture today. Overseas Chinese control 40%-70% of non-Confucian Southeast Asian nations’ economies. Overseas Chinese residing in various Southeast Asian countries form mutual help associations and business chambers that become members’ sources of business information, contacts, merchandise credits and cash loans. ‘Good name’ association members are able to access part of the $4 trillion in stock market capital and bank deposits in Hong Kong, Singapore and Mainland China. Hardly any ‘native’ Southeast Asians are able to directly penetrate such networks. In 1987, Overseas Chinese were first to open joint venture factories in Mainland China. Today China is poised to become ‘top dog’ worldwide in Gross Domestic Production come 2050 or so.
Confucian Japan had an even brighter success story. In 1860s Japan quickly industrialized thru government importation of entire factories, industries and technologies from US, German and UK companies. The industries were later sold at low prices and on installment to the Japanese oligarchy. State-business synergy enabled Japan to challenge Western imperialist powers and beat them in their own game of building huge Asian markets thru 'diplomatic threat' and use of military force. The expensive game (in massive losses of wealth and lives) ended in Japanese military defeat in 1945. However the ‘conqueror’ (USA) quickly allowed Japanese industry to rise again. Reason: UN forces were losing the Pacific Rim to China’s Communist army and only Japan had the industrial might to help hold the Capitalist frontier. Japan used the consequent billions of dollars in US reconstruction loans to begin a conquest of market niches all over the world. By 1960s, Japan had risen to second richest nation worldwide (the USA was No. 1), beating by a wide margin the long-standing European imperialist powers. In the 1990s despite world recessions, Japanese ‘mass capital’ was largest worldwide at $12 trillion in bank deposits and investment instruments held by the thrifty Japanese public. These days the Japanese masses are actually wealthier than US masses, considering the far narrower Japanese wealth gaps (due to small differences in executive and worker pay). In the USA, executives earn an average of 40 times the salaries of line workers. Additionally, US masses are nose-deep in debt while Japanese citizens’ savings, stocks and bond holdings are still the highest worldwide.
What are the lessons for hapless non-Confucian 3rd World economies? The Philippines for one has a tiny economy at a mere 1/40th of Japanese production. Bank savings and stock market assets come up to less than $100 billion equivalent. The production of all Philippine businesses does not even approach the sales of just one major Japanese conglomerate company. The Philippine ‘family’ is blood family and nothing more. The society as ‘family’ and politicians as ‘fathers’ are laughable concepts, for unlimited corruption is a state tradition. The Philippine governmental system of checks and balances among state bureaucracies and political parties has become a model of government paralysis, as Party interest has become the guide. Politicians consider the business sector as milking cow and nothing more, a tradition that creates economic paralysis and widespread poverty. Regime planning focuses on how to spend taxes and state loans on showy projects that earn contractors’ commissions for top-to-bottom bureaucratic signatories. ‘Standard’ skim-offs have risen from 10% in the 1960s to 60% these days, divided among national-level politicians down to village-level officials. State-business planning for production and mass wealth is not possible, for the two sectors distrust each other.
The Philippine populace cannot become ‘family’ either, for they are perpetually embroiled in all manner of religious and political debates. Winning arguments is much preferred over winning friends, customers and future business. Companies fight tooth and nail over tiny local markets. There are hardly any corporate mergers to access international markets. Trust is a scarce currency among Philippine entrepreneurs. Every agreement has to be written down to the fine print, so unlike Chinese business culture wherein word is bond, and ‘face’ is enough to get unsecured credits.
Philippine oligarchs for their part will never stomach the concept of workers as ‘family,’ for tradition teaches that employees are mere tools for acquisition of more wealth. Further, Philippine rich-poor gaps are so stratospheric that the rich have a world of their own that is so strange from that of the masses. ‘Gods’ and ‘slaves’ cannot be ‘family.’ Workers have retaliated for decades thru strikes and work stoppages that scared away foreign investors. Lately, companies have used job scarcity as an effective tool to minimize wages and employee benefits thru contractual employment, outsourcing, and endless recycling of ‘trainees.’ Not one Philippine entrepreneur seems to think that raising employee incomes results to larger markets which means more sales and profits. ‘Each to himself’ is the prevalent culture.
All these considered, one way out of poverty becomes clear for the Philippines and the rest of the 3rd World: create mutual help and social harmony among all sectors of society by adopting the Confucian concept of ‘family.’ The 3rd World can even improve on the Confucian culture by passing laws that grant state loans to thousand-employee groups that set up joint ventures with 1st World corporations. Such laws will enable employee masses to earn high ‘sideline income’ (dividends) while acquiring fortunes in stock shares. Employee part-ownership of companies thru state loans will fast-track the development of a Confucian culture while building what the 3rd World sorely lacks: economic democracy.
From 1860s when Confucian Japan began to adopt Western-style corporations as weapons against poverty and industrial backwardness, Kung Fu Tzu’s culture asserted itself. The Japanese corporation became ‘family.’ Whenever possible, the biggest Japanese companies took in employees for life and showered them with benefits as the ‘corporate children.’ The gaps in salaries between ranks and between managers and their worker teams were not wide. Workers performed as teams, their managers as true ‘big brothers’ evidenced by their willingness to accept such small differences in pay between ranks. Managers and workers routinely studied production systems and made suggestions on improvements without expecting ‘instant reward.’ Reward came for everyone thru improved sales, profits, and bonuses that at times were given four times a year. The various hierarchies of line-level and managerial teams constantly searched for improvements in product quality, production process, world-scale marketing, building of corporate groups, and planning with state ‘fathers’ for conquest of world markets. The entire Japanese employee population became one ‘family’ struggling against 1st World economies in competitive business.
One sees the effects of this Confucian culture today. Overseas Chinese control 40%-70% of non-Confucian Southeast Asian nations’ economies. Overseas Chinese residing in various Southeast Asian countries form mutual help associations and business chambers that become members’ sources of business information, contacts, merchandise credits and cash loans. ‘Good name’ association members are able to access part of the $4 trillion in stock market capital and bank deposits in Hong Kong, Singapore and Mainland China. Hardly any ‘native’ Southeast Asians are able to directly penetrate such networks. In 1987, Overseas Chinese were first to open joint venture factories in Mainland China. Today China is poised to become ‘top dog’ worldwide in Gross Domestic Production come 2050 or so.
Confucian Japan had an even brighter success story. In 1860s Japan quickly industrialized thru government importation of entire factories, industries and technologies from US, German and UK companies. The industries were later sold at low prices and on installment to the Japanese oligarchy. State-business synergy enabled Japan to challenge Western imperialist powers and beat them in their own game of building huge Asian markets thru 'diplomatic threat' and use of military force. The expensive game (in massive losses of wealth and lives) ended in Japanese military defeat in 1945. However the ‘conqueror’ (USA) quickly allowed Japanese industry to rise again. Reason: UN forces were losing the Pacific Rim to China’s Communist army and only Japan had the industrial might to help hold the Capitalist frontier. Japan used the consequent billions of dollars in US reconstruction loans to begin a conquest of market niches all over the world. By 1960s, Japan had risen to second richest nation worldwide (the USA was No. 1), beating by a wide margin the long-standing European imperialist powers. In the 1990s despite world recessions, Japanese ‘mass capital’ was largest worldwide at $12 trillion in bank deposits and investment instruments held by the thrifty Japanese public. These days the Japanese masses are actually wealthier than US masses, considering the far narrower Japanese wealth gaps (due to small differences in executive and worker pay). In the USA, executives earn an average of 40 times the salaries of line workers. Additionally, US masses are nose-deep in debt while Japanese citizens’ savings, stocks and bond holdings are still the highest worldwide.
What are the lessons for hapless non-Confucian 3rd World economies? The Philippines for one has a tiny economy at a mere 1/40th of Japanese production. Bank savings and stock market assets come up to less than $100 billion equivalent. The production of all Philippine businesses does not even approach the sales of just one major Japanese conglomerate company. The Philippine ‘family’ is blood family and nothing more. The society as ‘family’ and politicians as ‘fathers’ are laughable concepts, for unlimited corruption is a state tradition. The Philippine governmental system of checks and balances among state bureaucracies and political parties has become a model of government paralysis, as Party interest has become the guide. Politicians consider the business sector as milking cow and nothing more, a tradition that creates economic paralysis and widespread poverty. Regime planning focuses on how to spend taxes and state loans on showy projects that earn contractors’ commissions for top-to-bottom bureaucratic signatories. ‘Standard’ skim-offs have risen from 10% in the 1960s to 60% these days, divided among national-level politicians down to village-level officials. State-business planning for production and mass wealth is not possible, for the two sectors distrust each other.
The Philippine populace cannot become ‘family’ either, for they are perpetually embroiled in all manner of religious and political debates. Winning arguments is much preferred over winning friends, customers and future business. Companies fight tooth and nail over tiny local markets. There are hardly any corporate mergers to access international markets. Trust is a scarce currency among Philippine entrepreneurs. Every agreement has to be written down to the fine print, so unlike Chinese business culture wherein word is bond, and ‘face’ is enough to get unsecured credits.
Philippine oligarchs for their part will never stomach the concept of workers as ‘family,’ for tradition teaches that employees are mere tools for acquisition of more wealth. Further, Philippine rich-poor gaps are so stratospheric that the rich have a world of their own that is so strange from that of the masses. ‘Gods’ and ‘slaves’ cannot be ‘family.’ Workers have retaliated for decades thru strikes and work stoppages that scared away foreign investors. Lately, companies have used job scarcity as an effective tool to minimize wages and employee benefits thru contractual employment, outsourcing, and endless recycling of ‘trainees.’ Not one Philippine entrepreneur seems to think that raising employee incomes results to larger markets which means more sales and profits. ‘Each to himself’ is the prevalent culture.
All these considered, one way out of poverty becomes clear for the Philippines and the rest of the 3rd World: create mutual help and social harmony among all sectors of society by adopting the Confucian concept of ‘family.’ The 3rd World can even improve on the Confucian culture by passing laws that grant state loans to thousand-employee groups that set up joint ventures with 1st World corporations. Such laws will enable employee masses to earn high ‘sideline income’ (dividends) while acquiring fortunes in stock shares. Employee part-ownership of companies thru state loans will fast-track the development of a Confucian culture while building what the 3rd World sorely lacks: economic democracy.
Saturday, January 30, 2010
Overseas Chinese Mutual Help: Anti-poverty Tactic
In Southeast Asia, some ten million Overseas Chinese are exceedingly wealthy, while around 400 million natives suffer varying degrees of poverty. Why? History provides answers. In the 1600s to 1800s, all of Southeast Asia save Thailand was colonized by Western powers. Chinese entrepreneurs who were already trading with Southeast Asians saw the profit-making opportunity in colonial rule. They supplied Chinese labor to colonial plantations, shipbuilding yards and state projects. They served as tax collectors on commission, which further cemented their ties with the colonists, who stayed mainly in cities. The same Chinese entrepreneurs built trading nets region-wide, buying spices, raw sugar, rubber, coffee, fibers, tobacco and other semi-processed products from natives and selling them to colonial companies that exported to European and US markets. From Hong Kong and Singapore came Western consumer goods which the entrepreneurs sold in region-wide retailing nets. The Chinese had become indispensable to both colonizers and colonized.
When revolutions drove away the colonizers, the native governments inherited dependence on Chinese business nets and their international supply sources. Native governments tried to build native businesses but their limited resources and the absence of a strong entrepreneurial culture among the masses hardly brought a dent to the 60%-70% Chinese control of Southeast Asian business. The Chinese tradition of mutual help contributed to the huge wealth gaps. Chinese families, clans, village mates and Chinese with ‘face’ (good character and ability to pay) formed mutual help associations that provided loans in cash and merchandise. Inability to pay meant loss of ‘face’ so Chinese debtors worked day and night to repay their loans and thereby borrow more. Nose-deep debt coupled with isolation among natives with different mindsets forced among Overseas Chinese a culture of hard work, thriftiness, pragmatism, and desire for wealth to provide for an uncertain future. Native hostility which in several cases led to murders and pogroms of Chinese pooled some $2 trillion in Chinese capital towards Hong Kong and Singapore, where they became sources of even larger loan funds for all Chinese region-wide. No native could penetrate such ‘closed circuit’ business culture.
Hardly any native tried anyway, for most were religious who viewed wealth as ‘source of all evil.’ In the Philippines, 400 years of religious instruction drilled into the native subconscious the paralyzing notion that wealth is an impediment towards ‘permanent happiness in heaven,’ and instead creates ‘mere fleeting earthly joys.’ From early 1900s onwards, Communist propaganda added the equally debilitating idea that all landlords and businessmen are exploiters. Subdividing old wealth, not creating new wealth was the recommended ideal, something that some 40,000 armed rebels fought for in the 1970s and which has largely paralyzed rural business nationwide.
In some sense the religious and political propagandists were right, for Southeast Asian politicians who partnered with Overseas Chinese in setting up corporations (the Suharto group had 400, Marcos had 300 in 1986) were not exactly paragons of virtue. The region’s billionaire Overseas Chinese ‘taipans’ who owned or controlled 20 to 80 companies each were not ‘mass-friendly’ either. Nor did the region’s entrepreneurial class build enough businesses to employ some 400 million poor in jobs that guarantee at least lower-middle class incomes. Instead most entrepreneurs considered labor as ‘business tools,’ flaunted their wealth, imported all manner of luxuries, acted like royalty, and abused all powerless. Wealth it appeared, is truly no way to get to heaven.
Yet there are historical instances in the region when wealth and virtue actually mixed. In 1600s-1800s Philippines for instance, Spanish-native religious communities multiplied donations of land, cash, jewelry and other forms of wealth by engaging in the highly profitable Manila-Acapulco galleon trade, running universities, hospitals, and schools, and lending money to traders. The Spanish friar orders also titled some 200,000 hectares of agricultural land and rented them out to Filipino-Chinese (mixed blood) entrepreneurs engaged in the sugar export, retail and money-lending trades. Yet not one member of the religious communities ever got wealthy. Most community profits went towards the running of orphanages, homes for the aged, scholarships, aid to indigents and the sick, milk to infants of poor parents, and even part of the huge ransom paid to the English fleet that once occupied Manila. In end-1890s the religious friars were driven out by native revolutionaries but the Americans came in as new colonizers. The new government awarded friar lands to ‘natives’ who of course turned out to be the wealthy Filipino-Chinese who rented the lands. ‘Wealth for good’ became history, for the new owners had nothing in mind but to become part of the local oligarchy. Thankfully, new religious institutions continued the culture of unending charity works by running hospitals, universities, and schools and using most profits to finance good works.
What are the anti-poverty lessons? Economic history shows that culture and religious beliefs play a major part in the wealth and poverty of peoples. Unfortunately in the Philippines, ‘excessive wealth’ is still viewed as root of evil, and one is supposed to aspire only to the middle classes. Since one cannot maintain middle class incomes without investing in business (which means possession of ‘excessive wealth’), the most that Filipinos can set up are micro-scale buy/sell or crafts businesses. Few native entrepreneurs even think of merging their small businesses to access world markets. All Philippine business production cannot even match the sales of a single major US or Japanese corporation. Native business associations for mutual help are mainly social clubs where members probe for business opportunities largely in government. 'Face' is no guide, as evidenced by fine-print contracts at every transaction.
As one may see from these, the way out of poverty would require the reshaping of millions of people’s mindsets, especially those of 3rd World ‘natives.’ It can take ages to unlearn such beliefs as ‘money is the root of all evil,’ but it can be done thru such aphorisms as ‘wealth is a tool for good.’ Words however are of little effect. Examples are best. To really end poverty, the 3rd World needs ‘large-scale’ exemplars: millions of employees as thousand-member entrepreneurial groups setting up corporations thru state funding laws and joint ventures with 1st World companies. The scheme raises the incomes of 3rd World employee masses (who earn just $200-$500 monthly), while creating millions of jobs for the bottom poor all throughout eternity (courtesy of eternal laws). ‘Business as tool for good’ thereby becomes world culture, a source of spiritual fulfillment for all humanity.
When revolutions drove away the colonizers, the native governments inherited dependence on Chinese business nets and their international supply sources. Native governments tried to build native businesses but their limited resources and the absence of a strong entrepreneurial culture among the masses hardly brought a dent to the 60%-70% Chinese control of Southeast Asian business. The Chinese tradition of mutual help contributed to the huge wealth gaps. Chinese families, clans, village mates and Chinese with ‘face’ (good character and ability to pay) formed mutual help associations that provided loans in cash and merchandise. Inability to pay meant loss of ‘face’ so Chinese debtors worked day and night to repay their loans and thereby borrow more. Nose-deep debt coupled with isolation among natives with different mindsets forced among Overseas Chinese a culture of hard work, thriftiness, pragmatism, and desire for wealth to provide for an uncertain future. Native hostility which in several cases led to murders and pogroms of Chinese pooled some $2 trillion in Chinese capital towards Hong Kong and Singapore, where they became sources of even larger loan funds for all Chinese region-wide. No native could penetrate such ‘closed circuit’ business culture.
Hardly any native tried anyway, for most were religious who viewed wealth as ‘source of all evil.’ In the Philippines, 400 years of religious instruction drilled into the native subconscious the paralyzing notion that wealth is an impediment towards ‘permanent happiness in heaven,’ and instead creates ‘mere fleeting earthly joys.’ From early 1900s onwards, Communist propaganda added the equally debilitating idea that all landlords and businessmen are exploiters. Subdividing old wealth, not creating new wealth was the recommended ideal, something that some 40,000 armed rebels fought for in the 1970s and which has largely paralyzed rural business nationwide.
In some sense the religious and political propagandists were right, for Southeast Asian politicians who partnered with Overseas Chinese in setting up corporations (the Suharto group had 400, Marcos had 300 in 1986) were not exactly paragons of virtue. The region’s billionaire Overseas Chinese ‘taipans’ who owned or controlled 20 to 80 companies each were not ‘mass-friendly’ either. Nor did the region’s entrepreneurial class build enough businesses to employ some 400 million poor in jobs that guarantee at least lower-middle class incomes. Instead most entrepreneurs considered labor as ‘business tools,’ flaunted their wealth, imported all manner of luxuries, acted like royalty, and abused all powerless. Wealth it appeared, is truly no way to get to heaven.
Yet there are historical instances in the region when wealth and virtue actually mixed. In 1600s-1800s Philippines for instance, Spanish-native religious communities multiplied donations of land, cash, jewelry and other forms of wealth by engaging in the highly profitable Manila-Acapulco galleon trade, running universities, hospitals, and schools, and lending money to traders. The Spanish friar orders also titled some 200,000 hectares of agricultural land and rented them out to Filipino-Chinese (mixed blood) entrepreneurs engaged in the sugar export, retail and money-lending trades. Yet not one member of the religious communities ever got wealthy. Most community profits went towards the running of orphanages, homes for the aged, scholarships, aid to indigents and the sick, milk to infants of poor parents, and even part of the huge ransom paid to the English fleet that once occupied Manila. In end-1890s the religious friars were driven out by native revolutionaries but the Americans came in as new colonizers. The new government awarded friar lands to ‘natives’ who of course turned out to be the wealthy Filipino-Chinese who rented the lands. ‘Wealth for good’ became history, for the new owners had nothing in mind but to become part of the local oligarchy. Thankfully, new religious institutions continued the culture of unending charity works by running hospitals, universities, and schools and using most profits to finance good works.
What are the anti-poverty lessons? Economic history shows that culture and religious beliefs play a major part in the wealth and poverty of peoples. Unfortunately in the Philippines, ‘excessive wealth’ is still viewed as root of evil, and one is supposed to aspire only to the middle classes. Since one cannot maintain middle class incomes without investing in business (which means possession of ‘excessive wealth’), the most that Filipinos can set up are micro-scale buy/sell or crafts businesses. Few native entrepreneurs even think of merging their small businesses to access world markets. All Philippine business production cannot even match the sales of a single major US or Japanese corporation. Native business associations for mutual help are mainly social clubs where members probe for business opportunities largely in government. 'Face' is no guide, as evidenced by fine-print contracts at every transaction.
As one may see from these, the way out of poverty would require the reshaping of millions of people’s mindsets, especially those of 3rd World ‘natives.’ It can take ages to unlearn such beliefs as ‘money is the root of all evil,’ but it can be done thru such aphorisms as ‘wealth is a tool for good.’ Words however are of little effect. Examples are best. To really end poverty, the 3rd World needs ‘large-scale’ exemplars: millions of employees as thousand-member entrepreneurial groups setting up corporations thru state funding laws and joint ventures with 1st World companies. The scheme raises the incomes of 3rd World employee masses (who earn just $200-$500 monthly), while creating millions of jobs for the bottom poor all throughout eternity (courtesy of eternal laws). ‘Business as tool for good’ thereby becomes world culture, a source of spiritual fulfillment for all humanity.
Sunday, December 6, 2009
PART 6 of 6: FARMS FOR SLUMS PROGRAM
Conclusion: The end of mass poverty in the Philippines
One can deduce the happy events once the industries described come to full operation:
(1) All working-age Philippine poor get high-paying jobs, qualify for LME loans and help set up more joint ventures. Slum dwellers spread out to good jobs in the provinces where they rise to the middle classes, afford good education, qualify for LME loans, and help set up more co-ops and joint ventures all over the tropics.
(2) Every Filipino employee becomes owner of a stack of corporate shares and bonds that earn dividends and interest and rises in value over the years.
(3) Domestic production multiplying 20 times or more raises tax income to stratospheric levels. The government manages to repay all its old loans which currently consume a huge chunk of tax proceeds for interest alone. Repayment of old loans qualifies the government to sell billions of dollars in new bonds worldwide, most proceeds to be lent out to LME-type joint ventures.
(4) Mass entrepreneurship as culture pervades Philippine schools and universities. Currently 66% of Filipinos are Elementary level. As one may notice, most industries previously described are geared towards employment of all such unschooled, given a little on-the-job training. In effect, the schemes target creation of good-paying jobs for the bottom poor. Hunger, malnutrition, inability to afford health care and education, and other sufferings of the bottom poor become a mere chapter of Philippine history.
(5) Over 54 million of the current bottom poor who ultimately get good paying rural jobs become a massive market for all manner of consumer goods. Manufacturers of such goods become markets for producer goods, mainly factory machines from industrial countries. Philippine industry expands to 1st World levels, especially when mass-owned companies spread out all over the tropics.
(6) The culture of mass entrepreneurship prevailing within Philippine society encourages companies to give incentives to unschooled employees to study to university and doctorate level. Since most of the companies are rural, internet education, roving teachers and rural laboratories become standard. Subjects on mass entrepreneurship form basic lessons. History subjects dwell on the activities of traders, inventors, innovators, financing companies and operators of corporate groups, not on kings and politicians as usual. Student teams are required to specialize in the sciences and form invention and innovation teams. Basic requirement for college graduation is the ability of student teams to develop at least five technologies that they license to joint ventures. The scheme makes millionaires of teams, and develops a habit of invention and innovation among the masses. Consequently, joint venture ideas perpetually flow among the working masses as large entrepreneurial groups. World-scale mass entrepreneurship as permanent culture makes sure that the masses never revert to poverty.
Let the battles begin!
Conclusion: The end of mass poverty in the Philippines
One can deduce the happy events once the industries described come to full operation:
(1) All working-age Philippine poor get high-paying jobs, qualify for LME loans and help set up more joint ventures. Slum dwellers spread out to good jobs in the provinces where they rise to the middle classes, afford good education, qualify for LME loans, and help set up more co-ops and joint ventures all over the tropics.
(2) Every Filipino employee becomes owner of a stack of corporate shares and bonds that earn dividends and interest and rises in value over the years.
(3) Domestic production multiplying 20 times or more raises tax income to stratospheric levels. The government manages to repay all its old loans which currently consume a huge chunk of tax proceeds for interest alone. Repayment of old loans qualifies the government to sell billions of dollars in new bonds worldwide, most proceeds to be lent out to LME-type joint ventures.
(4) Mass entrepreneurship as culture pervades Philippine schools and universities. Currently 66% of Filipinos are Elementary level. As one may notice, most industries previously described are geared towards employment of all such unschooled, given a little on-the-job training. In effect, the schemes target creation of good-paying jobs for the bottom poor. Hunger, malnutrition, inability to afford health care and education, and other sufferings of the bottom poor become a mere chapter of Philippine history.
(5) Over 54 million of the current bottom poor who ultimately get good paying rural jobs become a massive market for all manner of consumer goods. Manufacturers of such goods become markets for producer goods, mainly factory machines from industrial countries. Philippine industry expands to 1st World levels, especially when mass-owned companies spread out all over the tropics.
(6) The culture of mass entrepreneurship prevailing within Philippine society encourages companies to give incentives to unschooled employees to study to university and doctorate level. Since most of the companies are rural, internet education, roving teachers and rural laboratories become standard. Subjects on mass entrepreneurship form basic lessons. History subjects dwell on the activities of traders, inventors, innovators, financing companies and operators of corporate groups, not on kings and politicians as usual. Student teams are required to specialize in the sciences and form invention and innovation teams. Basic requirement for college graduation is the ability of student teams to develop at least five technologies that they license to joint ventures. The scheme makes millionaires of teams, and develops a habit of invention and innovation among the masses. Consequently, joint venture ideas perpetually flow among the working masses as large entrepreneurial groups. World-scale mass entrepreneurship as permanent culture makes sure that the masses never revert to poverty.
Let the battles begin!
PART 5 of 6: FARMS FOR SLUMS PROGRAM
13) Sixth LME industry: Marine aquacultures. An LME type joint venture leases 3,000 hectares of Philippine sea shallows and installs artificial reefs upon the bottoms. Artificial reefs are thin concrete tubes tied onto pyramidal frames that rise six to ten meters above the sea bottom. The reefs become home to thick populations of all manner of fishes, crustaceans, bivalves and other sea creatures. The innumerable crevices within the artificial reefs becomes hiding places for all species, enabling all young to survive predators from a low of 1% in nature to up to 20% with copious artificial reefs. This means tons of seafood ingredients and millions of dollars in export sales for the joint venture. The foreign partner (Japanese, Korean, Coastal Chinese, Western) provides the bank contacts that finances work boats, refrigeration and fish processing facilities, submerged cages, breeding facilities, diving equipment, and other necessities. A third of artificial reefs must be considered breeding reserve, never to be harvested. Only dive tourists may be allowed onto the reserves. If most of the Philippines’ 200 million hectares of seas become aquaculture farms with diving resorts, tens of billions of dollars will add to the Philippine masses’ wealth on monthly basis.
14) Seventh LME industry: mini-hydropower plants. The Philippines has 130 major rivers all fed by upland streams that flow from mountains averaging 1,500 meters in height. Most of the streams dry up during the dry season because the mountains are mostly bald. An LME type joint venture may lease an upland area with a stream net and reforest the entire area to ensure year-round water for the streams. A chain of watersheds with mini-dams may thence be built to generate megawatt-level electric power. Power gets sold to the rising number of rural industries previously described. Since it takes years to reforest bald uplands, the joint venture may set up a livestock project as previously described to earn short term income. Multiply this scheme several hundred times all over Southeast Asia (which has thousands of rivers) and we employ millions of Asian poor. The power chains will tend to create rural industries in a region where 40-60% of populations crowd into cities. Obviously the Philippine masses who start and manage such industries will gain billions of dollars monthly.
15) Eighth LME industry: manufacture of machinery parts. The Philippines has over 200 million metric tons of nickel and chromate reserves, and around two billion tons of copper reserves. A little nickel and chromate added to low-priced imported carbon steel produces high-priced stainless steel and alloy steels that can be shaped into all manner of machinery parts. Additionally, copper production can be converted into wires that are the principal parts of electric motors, which powers all types of factory machines, elevators, and escalators. LME-type joint ventures may set up such industries. Partners may be 1st World manufacturers of electric furnaces, factory machinery, mini steel mills, and ore processing equipment. Of course the industries will channel more billions of dollars monthly to the Philippine employee masses.
16) Ninth to nth LME industries may be set up by 30,000 Philippine employee groups of 1,000+ members each (including Filipinos abroad) and their foreign joint venture partners. 30 million entrepreneurial brains and their allies should create endless ideas which the same brains as groups may implement at great profit for themselves and the resultant employed masses. The end result: perpetual flow of wealth among the Philippine masses.
13) Sixth LME industry: Marine aquacultures. An LME type joint venture leases 3,000 hectares of Philippine sea shallows and installs artificial reefs upon the bottoms. Artificial reefs are thin concrete tubes tied onto pyramidal frames that rise six to ten meters above the sea bottom. The reefs become home to thick populations of all manner of fishes, crustaceans, bivalves and other sea creatures. The innumerable crevices within the artificial reefs becomes hiding places for all species, enabling all young to survive predators from a low of 1% in nature to up to 20% with copious artificial reefs. This means tons of seafood ingredients and millions of dollars in export sales for the joint venture. The foreign partner (Japanese, Korean, Coastal Chinese, Western) provides the bank contacts that finances work boats, refrigeration and fish processing facilities, submerged cages, breeding facilities, diving equipment, and other necessities. A third of artificial reefs must be considered breeding reserve, never to be harvested. Only dive tourists may be allowed onto the reserves. If most of the Philippines’ 200 million hectares of seas become aquaculture farms with diving resorts, tens of billions of dollars will add to the Philippine masses’ wealth on monthly basis.
14) Seventh LME industry: mini-hydropower plants. The Philippines has 130 major rivers all fed by upland streams that flow from mountains averaging 1,500 meters in height. Most of the streams dry up during the dry season because the mountains are mostly bald. An LME type joint venture may lease an upland area with a stream net and reforest the entire area to ensure year-round water for the streams. A chain of watersheds with mini-dams may thence be built to generate megawatt-level electric power. Power gets sold to the rising number of rural industries previously described. Since it takes years to reforest bald uplands, the joint venture may set up a livestock project as previously described to earn short term income. Multiply this scheme several hundred times all over Southeast Asia (which has thousands of rivers) and we employ millions of Asian poor. The power chains will tend to create rural industries in a region where 40-60% of populations crowd into cities. Obviously the Philippine masses who start and manage such industries will gain billions of dollars monthly.
15) Eighth LME industry: manufacture of machinery parts. The Philippines has over 200 million metric tons of nickel and chromate reserves, and around two billion tons of copper reserves. A little nickel and chromate added to low-priced imported carbon steel produces high-priced stainless steel and alloy steels that can be shaped into all manner of machinery parts. Additionally, copper production can be converted into wires that are the principal parts of electric motors, which powers all types of factory machines, elevators, and escalators. LME-type joint ventures may set up such industries. Partners may be 1st World manufacturers of electric furnaces, factory machinery, mini steel mills, and ore processing equipment. Of course the industries will channel more billions of dollars monthly to the Philippine employee masses.
16) Ninth to nth LME industries may be set up by 30,000 Philippine employee groups of 1,000+ members each (including Filipinos abroad) and their foreign joint venture partners. 30 million entrepreneurial brains and their allies should create endless ideas which the same brains as groups may implement at great profit for themselves and the resultant employed masses. The end result: perpetual flow of wealth among the Philippine masses.
PART 4 of 6: FARMS FOR SLUMS PROGRAM
8) First LME industry for thousand-member employee groups: ethanol distilleries with sweet sorghum plantations. According to Brazilian experience, an ethanol distillery fed by sugarcane profits at an astonishing 80% of sales! Since sweet sorghum is sweeter than sugar cane and can be cropped twice or thrice a year thru ratooning (sugarcane harvests occur only once a year), Philippine sweet sorghum-fed distilleries will tend to have even higher profit margins than those of Brazil. Markets are no problem. E75 fuel (75% ethanol, 25% gasoline) can be priced at less than half that of pure gasoline, a boon to local transport industries. A 40,000 liters-per-day ethanol distillery with sweet sorghum plantation requires around $10 million in capital. LME funds required is only $2.5 million (in peso equivalent). The foreign partner contributes another $2.5 million. Equipment manufacturers’ banks or foreign government banks may supply $5 million in distillery equipment loans. This arrangement enables the Philippine employee mass to set up hundreds of distilleries all over the Philippines, with expansion plans all over the tropics. This industry when mature can yield billions of dollars in monthly salaries and dividends to the Philippine employee masses.
9) Second LME industry: manufacture of Ethanol-powered engines (E75) to replace carbon-spewing gasoline and diesel engines in local land and sea transports. Employee group joint ventures may set up the factories plus hundreds of transport service companies (buses, taxis, cars for hire, cargo trucks, boats and launches) all over Southeast Asia. This industry once mature can add more billions of dollars monthly to the Philippine masses.
10) Third LME industry: managed forests with livestock feedlots. Many species of forest trees have leaves that contain 20% protein. Same with leguminous grasses. Such leaves and grasses may replace the expensive protein sources (soybean meal, fish meal and bone meal) in commercial feeds. Local sourcing also prevents expensive transport and preservation, another cost cutter. An employee union of several thousand members may lease a thousand hectares of bald uplands and convert 80% of area to forest and 20% to paddocks, feedlots, leguminous grasslands and corn/sorghum croplands. The farm targets raising of mixed breed goats, cattle, sheep, pigs, and fowls by the thousands. The livestock yields short-term income as forest trees grow. Over the long run, the forests produce woods, bamboo and rattan for lumber, paper and furniture, tons of fruits, honey, mushrooms, orchids, ornamental plants, drug ingredients, etc. Restaurateurs and food processors from Coastal Asia may partner with the locals and engage in contract production of food and drug ingredients. The scheme may be expanded by the employee unions throughout the tropics not only for job and wealth creation for the poor but also to help diminish global warming on massive scale. Tropics-wide operation of such managed forests and livestock farms adds more billions of dollars monthly to the Philippine employee mass.
11) Fourth LME industry: Tour boat fleets. World companies engaged in travel, tours, and resort development may partner with local LME beneficiary groups to set up tour boat fleets. A fleet may be composed of ten or so trawler-type boats, recreational boats, converted ferries and yachts, plus marine sports equipment. Yachting groups in the USA and Europe may partner with the local groups as well. The ethanol engine producers may install E75 engines to the boats to reduce fuel costs by more than half. Low-priced tours should attract millions of tourists. The fleets may tour all coastal resorts throughout Southeast Asia. Such fleets should add more billions of dollars monthly to the Philippine employee mass.
12) Fifth LME industry: Forest resorts. LME-type joint ventures may lease thousand-hectare bald island areas in Southeast Asia and convert them into forest resorts with ‘flowery cliff’ camouflaged hotels, inns, vacation and retirement condos, commercial buildings and sports facilities. The camouflage makes the resort ‘disappear’ into the forest, thereby attracting millions of tourists who want both unspoiled nature reserves and the latest living comforts of a ‘hidden city’. The role of forest resorts in reducing global warming plus tourist dollars coming in should persuade Southeast Asian governments to agree to thousand-hectare land leases for each joint venture. Resort construction and services at such scale should add more billions of dollars monthly to the Philippine employee mass.
8) First LME industry for thousand-member employee groups: ethanol distilleries with sweet sorghum plantations. According to Brazilian experience, an ethanol distillery fed by sugarcane profits at an astonishing 80% of sales! Since sweet sorghum is sweeter than sugar cane and can be cropped twice or thrice a year thru ratooning (sugarcane harvests occur only once a year), Philippine sweet sorghum-fed distilleries will tend to have even higher profit margins than those of Brazil. Markets are no problem. E75 fuel (75% ethanol, 25% gasoline) can be priced at less than half that of pure gasoline, a boon to local transport industries. A 40,000 liters-per-day ethanol distillery with sweet sorghum plantation requires around $10 million in capital. LME funds required is only $2.5 million (in peso equivalent). The foreign partner contributes another $2.5 million. Equipment manufacturers’ banks or foreign government banks may supply $5 million in distillery equipment loans. This arrangement enables the Philippine employee mass to set up hundreds of distilleries all over the Philippines, with expansion plans all over the tropics. This industry when mature can yield billions of dollars in monthly salaries and dividends to the Philippine employee masses.
9) Second LME industry: manufacture of Ethanol-powered engines (E75) to replace carbon-spewing gasoline and diesel engines in local land and sea transports. Employee group joint ventures may set up the factories plus hundreds of transport service companies (buses, taxis, cars for hire, cargo trucks, boats and launches) all over Southeast Asia. This industry once mature can add more billions of dollars monthly to the Philippine masses.
10) Third LME industry: managed forests with livestock feedlots. Many species of forest trees have leaves that contain 20% protein. Same with leguminous grasses. Such leaves and grasses may replace the expensive protein sources (soybean meal, fish meal and bone meal) in commercial feeds. Local sourcing also prevents expensive transport and preservation, another cost cutter. An employee union of several thousand members may lease a thousand hectares of bald uplands and convert 80% of area to forest and 20% to paddocks, feedlots, leguminous grasslands and corn/sorghum croplands. The farm targets raising of mixed breed goats, cattle, sheep, pigs, and fowls by the thousands. The livestock yields short-term income as forest trees grow. Over the long run, the forests produce woods, bamboo and rattan for lumber, paper and furniture, tons of fruits, honey, mushrooms, orchids, ornamental plants, drug ingredients, etc. Restaurateurs and food processors from Coastal Asia may partner with the locals and engage in contract production of food and drug ingredients. The scheme may be expanded by the employee unions throughout the tropics not only for job and wealth creation for the poor but also to help diminish global warming on massive scale. Tropics-wide operation of such managed forests and livestock farms adds more billions of dollars monthly to the Philippine employee mass.
11) Fourth LME industry: Tour boat fleets. World companies engaged in travel, tours, and resort development may partner with local LME beneficiary groups to set up tour boat fleets. A fleet may be composed of ten or so trawler-type boats, recreational boats, converted ferries and yachts, plus marine sports equipment. Yachting groups in the USA and Europe may partner with the local groups as well. The ethanol engine producers may install E75 engines to the boats to reduce fuel costs by more than half. Low-priced tours should attract millions of tourists. The fleets may tour all coastal resorts throughout Southeast Asia. Such fleets should add more billions of dollars monthly to the Philippine employee mass.
12) Fifth LME industry: Forest resorts. LME-type joint ventures may lease thousand-hectare bald island areas in Southeast Asia and convert them into forest resorts with ‘flowery cliff’ camouflaged hotels, inns, vacation and retirement condos, commercial buildings and sports facilities. The camouflage makes the resort ‘disappear’ into the forest, thereby attracting millions of tourists who want both unspoiled nature reserves and the latest living comforts of a ‘hidden city’. The role of forest resorts in reducing global warming plus tourist dollars coming in should persuade Southeast Asian governments to agree to thousand-hectare land leases for each joint venture. Resort construction and services at such scale should add more billions of dollars monthly to the Philippine employee mass.
PART 3 of 6: FARMS FOR SLUMS PROGRAM
These factors raise group retailing profits to 30-40% for crops, higher for groups who operate eateries, on year-round basis. All capital contributors may expect 10-20% dividends every quarter, higher at export stage. NGOs may consign their farms’ production to scores of slum families for retailing of low-priced rice, corn, fruits and vegetables, or retailing thru snack booths and eateries. Employee groups (co-op members) may similarly consign part of their farm harvests to retailing slum families who operate roving carts and food booths within the groups’ residential areas. High margins ensure good continuous incomes for said slum families. Workers in the coop paddocks, farm services teams, guard teams, and processing sections may come from the slums. The NGO may reward its donors with part of its farming income (coop dividends and 10-30% consignment profits), so donors may spread the word around and attract a lot more donations.
Out of these visions logically emanate our Farms for Slums objectives:
1) Sell all our friends, relatives and acquaintances to the Farms for Slums plan as previously described.
2) Form our relatives and friends into groups that establish one or several farms as above described. High earning group members and relatives of Filipinos working abroad are expected to contribute more. Employee members may contribute part of savings or acquire low interest salary loans from SSS, GSIS, credit unions, state banks or other sources.
3) Campaign vigorously to popularize our Farms for Slums plan among 30 million Filipino employees and micro-entrepreneurs, plus Filipino groups abroad. Each group member may contact his relatives and friends (down to Elementary School level) and sell them all to the Farms for Slums plan. Group contacts in mass media, the internet, associations and clubs are also a great help. Target: get the help of politicians (thru mass voting potential) for easy co-op access to state lending programs.
4) Campaign vigorously over the internet to get NGOs, charities and Filipino groups abroad into joining the Program and setting up their own 10-hectare farms. Local hard-up relatives or trusted contacts in the slums may be chosen as farm caretakers.
5) After proving our farms’ success, set up similar farms at double the area per group. Success may encourage group members who love farming to set up their own family farms. Ideal farm size for a family farm that assures permanent middle class income is twenty hectares, provided the farm is linked to a co-op that provides farm machines and facilities such as previously described.
6) The success of vanguard groups’ co-op farms should encourage a major portion of the Philippines’ over 30 million employees to set up copycat co-op farms. The happy result: all the country’s 18 million hectares of currently bald high-slope uplands planted to trees, thereby helping to reduce global warming. Low-slope farm areas planted to sorghum, corn, rice and vegetables can also absorb tons of atmospheric carbon. Continuous planting of row crops thru strip cropping and foliar fertilization (which prevents soil degradation) ensure year-round greenery which absorbs tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere per second.
7) Campaign vigorously among 30 million working masses and their families to pressure politicians (thru mass voting potential) into passing and promulgating a Loans for Mass Entrepreneurship Law. An LME law channels ten percent of taxes and state bonds (over P150 billion yearly) towards lending to joint ventures set up by thousand-employee groups and their foreign partners. The joint ventures must establish what shall become world-class companies selling planet-wide. Possible world-class industries arising from the LME law follow.
These factors raise group retailing profits to 30-40% for crops, higher for groups who operate eateries, on year-round basis. All capital contributors may expect 10-20% dividends every quarter, higher at export stage. NGOs may consign their farms’ production to scores of slum families for retailing of low-priced rice, corn, fruits and vegetables, or retailing thru snack booths and eateries. Employee groups (co-op members) may similarly consign part of their farm harvests to retailing slum families who operate roving carts and food booths within the groups’ residential areas. High margins ensure good continuous incomes for said slum families. Workers in the coop paddocks, farm services teams, guard teams, and processing sections may come from the slums. The NGO may reward its donors with part of its farming income (coop dividends and 10-30% consignment profits), so donors may spread the word around and attract a lot more donations.
Out of these visions logically emanate our Farms for Slums objectives:
1) Sell all our friends, relatives and acquaintances to the Farms for Slums plan as previously described.
2) Form our relatives and friends into groups that establish one or several farms as above described. High earning group members and relatives of Filipinos working abroad are expected to contribute more. Employee members may contribute part of savings or acquire low interest salary loans from SSS, GSIS, credit unions, state banks or other sources.
3) Campaign vigorously to popularize our Farms for Slums plan among 30 million Filipino employees and micro-entrepreneurs, plus Filipino groups abroad. Each group member may contact his relatives and friends (down to Elementary School level) and sell them all to the Farms for Slums plan. Group contacts in mass media, the internet, associations and clubs are also a great help. Target: get the help of politicians (thru mass voting potential) for easy co-op access to state lending programs.
4) Campaign vigorously over the internet to get NGOs, charities and Filipino groups abroad into joining the Program and setting up their own 10-hectare farms. Local hard-up relatives or trusted contacts in the slums may be chosen as farm caretakers.
5) After proving our farms’ success, set up similar farms at double the area per group. Success may encourage group members who love farming to set up their own family farms. Ideal farm size for a family farm that assures permanent middle class income is twenty hectares, provided the farm is linked to a co-op that provides farm machines and facilities such as previously described.
6) The success of vanguard groups’ co-op farms should encourage a major portion of the Philippines’ over 30 million employees to set up copycat co-op farms. The happy result: all the country’s 18 million hectares of currently bald high-slope uplands planted to trees, thereby helping to reduce global warming. Low-slope farm areas planted to sorghum, corn, rice and vegetables can also absorb tons of atmospheric carbon. Continuous planting of row crops thru strip cropping and foliar fertilization (which prevents soil degradation) ensure year-round greenery which absorbs tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere per second.
7) Campaign vigorously among 30 million working masses and their families to pressure politicians (thru mass voting potential) into passing and promulgating a Loans for Mass Entrepreneurship Law. An LME law channels ten percent of taxes and state bonds (over P150 billion yearly) towards lending to joint ventures set up by thousand-employee groups and their foreign partners. The joint ventures must establish what shall become world-class companies selling planet-wide. Possible world-class industries arising from the LME law follow.
PART 2 of 6: FARMS FOR SLUMS PROGRAM
(9) Each farm plants its five-hectare upland area into a random mix of bananas, hardwoods, softwoods, tapioca, Tricanthera and other high protein trees for livestock feed, cacao and cocoa, cashew, bamboo, rattan, anahaw, rambutan, macapuno coconut, longkan, jackfruit, star apple, lanzones, blackberries and forest berries, Indian mango, carabao mango, guyabano, avocado, ubi, fruit palms, chico, santol, guavas, mangosteen, macopa and other fruit trees. Randomly arranged trees of mixed species help control plant diseases and promise year-round harvests when the trees mature. Between the trees the farm installs honeybee colony boxes and mushroom shacks. Onto branches and trunks the farm grows orchids, bromeliads and other ornamental plants.
(10) After the first harvests of row crops, the group farm uses co-op loans and proceeds from sales of rice, corn and vegetables to buy the following starter livestock: (a) 1,000 range chicken pullets, (b) 500 duck pullets, (c) 2,000 quail layer pullets, (d) 20 mixed breed piglets, (e) 10 native breeder pigs (to be artificially inseminated), (f) 10 native goats (for artificial insemination), (g) 6 turkey pullets, (h) 10 sheep breeders, (i) if local governments have a cattle dispersal program, each farm gets one or two cattle or water buffaloes (for milking).
(11) The farms entrust half their livestock to co-op paddocks, feedlots and sheds to cut risks from robbery and as part of preventive medicine procedures. A veterinarian and an animal husbandry expert acts as consultants. A paddock manager and laborers manage the feedlots.
(12) The group farm uses its stock of rice grain wastes, ground corn and sorghum, salt, shellfish lime, plus harvested high protein tree leaves, vitamin mineral premix and sweet sorghum juice or syrup to formulate feeds for its livestock. The coop’s animal husbandry consultant advises on proper mixes. By using such home-grown ingredients, the farm brings down feed costs to a mere 20% of commercial feed prices. Since feeds comprise 80% of regular livestock farm costs, the group farm manages to earn large profit margins out of their livestock while using organic feeds (no chemical preservatives).
(13) As the group farms begin their livestock raising operations, the co-op sets up its processing facilities as follows: (a) Meat Processing Section to produce refrigerated cuts of chicken, pigs, sheep and goats, plus sausages, hams, smoked duck, pre-cooked meats for food ingredients, and flavored, ready to roast barbecues (pork and chicken), (b) Brown Sugar Section to mill part of farms’ sweet sorghum harvest and convert the juice into brown (muscovado) sugar and syrup.
(14) As the farms’ fruit trees mature, the coop sets up its Fruit Processing Section to produce anti-oxidant syrups (from forest berries), fruit juices, candied fruits, purees and fruit cocktail (canning contracted out), jams, berry wines, and regional sweets. Basic input is sweet sorghum syrup. The FP Section targets exportation of products to Hong Kong and Singapore where thousands of Filipina maids and cooks decide what meals to serve. Export products include flavored, ready to broil pork and chicken barbecues, hard boiled duck and quail eggs and pre-cooked meat cuts (ingredients for noodles and soups), pizza ingredients (mushrooms, sausages, cheese, chili), smoked duck and hams and processed dish ingredients contracted by Chinese restaurants.
(15) Groups of employees and their relatives (co-op members) who want to maximize their farm’s income sell their farms’ production on retail to scores of friends, co-workers, neighbors and local eateries. A major portion of harvests gets sold by cart retailers and food booth sellers from the slums. High profit margins are attained due to the following cost-cutting factors: (a) organic home-grown livestock feeds (80% savings); (b) use of foliar instead of basal fertilizer (60% savings) for all crops and trees; (c) use of organic pesticide out of local ingredients (40-60% savings); (d) rice hulls and corn cobs as crop dryer fuel (70% savings plus no grain losses from usual sun drying); (e) no marketing middlemen; (f) rice hull wastes as charcoal (70% profit); (g) milled sorghum stalks, corn and rice stover as fuel for brown sugar production (no fuel cost); (h) shared veterinary and agricultural experts’ fees (coop fees divided by 50 farms); (i) preventive medicine and expert care minimizing losses from livestock diseases; (j) low-cost food processing thru central co-op facilities; (k) upland rice species needing just 1/3 water compared to lowland rice, (l) low-cost water supply due to upland stream sourcing; (m) new breeds of range chicken as major livestock line don’t need expensive caging and feeding facilities. Mixed-breed chicken don’t easily fall prey to diseases. These help bring down farm costs; (n) Mixed breeds of pigs and goats are not prone to diseases either, and require mere inexpensive bamboo sheds for shelter, another cost-cutting factor; (o) The farm grows its own bamboos and woods, which means ‘free’ building materials for farm sheds and cottages, another cost-cutting feature; (p) home-grown (low-cost) sweet sorghum syrup as basic ingredient for fruit juices, health drinks, candied fruits and regional sweets lowers farmgate prices of such export items, hence maximizes profit margins.
(9) Each farm plants its five-hectare upland area into a random mix of bananas, hardwoods, softwoods, tapioca, Tricanthera and other high protein trees for livestock feed, cacao and cocoa, cashew, bamboo, rattan, anahaw, rambutan, macapuno coconut, longkan, jackfruit, star apple, lanzones, blackberries and forest berries, Indian mango, carabao mango, guyabano, avocado, ubi, fruit palms, chico, santol, guavas, mangosteen, macopa and other fruit trees. Randomly arranged trees of mixed species help control plant diseases and promise year-round harvests when the trees mature. Between the trees the farm installs honeybee colony boxes and mushroom shacks. Onto branches and trunks the farm grows orchids, bromeliads and other ornamental plants.
(10) After the first harvests of row crops, the group farm uses co-op loans and proceeds from sales of rice, corn and vegetables to buy the following starter livestock: (a) 1,000 range chicken pullets, (b) 500 duck pullets, (c) 2,000 quail layer pullets, (d) 20 mixed breed piglets, (e) 10 native breeder pigs (to be artificially inseminated), (f) 10 native goats (for artificial insemination), (g) 6 turkey pullets, (h) 10 sheep breeders, (i) if local governments have a cattle dispersal program, each farm gets one or two cattle or water buffaloes (for milking).
(11) The farms entrust half their livestock to co-op paddocks, feedlots and sheds to cut risks from robbery and as part of preventive medicine procedures. A veterinarian and an animal husbandry expert acts as consultants. A paddock manager and laborers manage the feedlots.
(12) The group farm uses its stock of rice grain wastes, ground corn and sorghum, salt, shellfish lime, plus harvested high protein tree leaves, vitamin mineral premix and sweet sorghum juice or syrup to formulate feeds for its livestock. The coop’s animal husbandry consultant advises on proper mixes. By using such home-grown ingredients, the farm brings down feed costs to a mere 20% of commercial feed prices. Since feeds comprise 80% of regular livestock farm costs, the group farm manages to earn large profit margins out of their livestock while using organic feeds (no chemical preservatives).
(13) As the group farms begin their livestock raising operations, the co-op sets up its processing facilities as follows: (a) Meat Processing Section to produce refrigerated cuts of chicken, pigs, sheep and goats, plus sausages, hams, smoked duck, pre-cooked meats for food ingredients, and flavored, ready to roast barbecues (pork and chicken), (b) Brown Sugar Section to mill part of farms’ sweet sorghum harvest and convert the juice into brown (muscovado) sugar and syrup.
(14) As the farms’ fruit trees mature, the coop sets up its Fruit Processing Section to produce anti-oxidant syrups (from forest berries), fruit juices, candied fruits, purees and fruit cocktail (canning contracted out), jams, berry wines, and regional sweets. Basic input is sweet sorghum syrup. The FP Section targets exportation of products to Hong Kong and Singapore where thousands of Filipina maids and cooks decide what meals to serve. Export products include flavored, ready to broil pork and chicken barbecues, hard boiled duck and quail eggs and pre-cooked meat cuts (ingredients for noodles and soups), pizza ingredients (mushrooms, sausages, cheese, chili), smoked duck and hams and processed dish ingredients contracted by Chinese restaurants.
(15) Groups of employees and their relatives (co-op members) who want to maximize their farm’s income sell their farms’ production on retail to scores of friends, co-workers, neighbors and local eateries. A major portion of harvests gets sold by cart retailers and food booth sellers from the slums. High profit margins are attained due to the following cost-cutting factors: (a) organic home-grown livestock feeds (80% savings); (b) use of foliar instead of basal fertilizer (60% savings) for all crops and trees; (c) use of organic pesticide out of local ingredients (40-60% savings); (d) rice hulls and corn cobs as crop dryer fuel (70% savings plus no grain losses from usual sun drying); (e) no marketing middlemen; (f) rice hull wastes as charcoal (70% profit); (g) milled sorghum stalks, corn and rice stover as fuel for brown sugar production (no fuel cost); (h) shared veterinary and agricultural experts’ fees (coop fees divided by 50 farms); (i) preventive medicine and expert care minimizing losses from livestock diseases; (j) low-cost food processing thru central co-op facilities; (k) upland rice species needing just 1/3 water compared to lowland rice, (l) low-cost water supply due to upland stream sourcing; (m) new breeds of range chicken as major livestock line don’t need expensive caging and feeding facilities. Mixed-breed chicken don’t easily fall prey to diseases. These help bring down farm costs; (n) Mixed breeds of pigs and goats are not prone to diseases either, and require mere inexpensive bamboo sheds for shelter, another cost-cutting factor; (o) The farm grows its own bamboos and woods, which means ‘free’ building materials for farm sheds and cottages, another cost-cutting feature; (p) home-grown (low-cost) sweet sorghum syrup as basic ingredient for fruit juices, health drinks, candied fruits and regional sweets lowers farmgate prices of such export items, hence maximizes profit margins.
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