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The Conference
“Complementary Currencies in Europe”
held in Germany
The conference “Complementary Currencies in Europe”
was held from July 18th to 22th at Katholisch Soziales Institut,
Bad Honnef, Germany. People gathered from a number of European
countries on top of the host country, plus seven participants
from out of Europe (Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Japan, United
States, Turkey), telling their experiences and tasks to be solved
for the future.
For this movement, known as “local money” in Japan,
the term “complementary currency”(CC) is generally
used recently in Europe. This term was suggested by Dr. Bernard
Lietaer, professor at Naropa University Boulder, Colorado,
United States and author of “The Future of Money,”
showing the need of a new monetary system which would play a
complementary role to the “Yang” aspects of today’s
official currencies. The expression “CC” was widely
used in the conference, proving that this concept has been well
diffused into European countries.
The first speech was given by Joachim Sikora, director
of KSI, who referred to today’s socioeconomic issues by
the neoliberalism, started in 1980s by Ronald Reagan and Margaret
Thatcher, such as the lower quality of social service by the
government, the public sector’s financial crisis, increase
of unemployment and the concentration of wealth, telling also
the importance of local production and consumption.
There was a severe question about the Catholic church’s
attitude in this respect and his answer was that we can improve
its understanding on this issue by keeping a good relationship
with priests who really work for social issues.
After him structural faults of our monetary systems as well
as practical methods to solve them were shown by Dr. Margrit
Kennedy, author of “Interest and Inflation free money.”
She argued that the current interest system is against the growth
curb in the natural world and contributes to the redistribution
of wealth in favor the rich, suggesting the use of B2B barter
clearing systems (such as WIRbank and Barter Card network),
regional currencies which are backed by the official one and
interest-free financing system in the official currency(like
JAK bank).
Experiences were given after these keynote speeches. Interesting
cases in European countries, including from Eastern Europe,
were reported, among others:
• Crédito (Italy): a local currency called
crédito has been circulated for 30 years within spiritual
communities called Damanhur, working as well as a tool to promote
local production and consumption within their communities.
• LIBRA(Italy): Project by professors at Bocconi Univ.,
Milan, trying to support non-profits and businesses.
• SOL(France): Three pilot projects will be operational
in September in France as a means of “solidarity economy,”
promoted by the French government.
• Chiemgauer(Germany): Euro-backed commodity voucher.
Three percent of the face value can be invested to a regional
development project that you choose.
• Zajeska(Slovakia): youngsters settled in a small
and deserted village, starting an organic-based new community
and using LETS to build a reciprocal relationship.
Dozens of workshops were held on the second half of the conference,
dealing with topics such as the relationship between the politics
and CC, how to talk to bankers, CC’s relationship with
permaculture and “collectiveintelligence ”(strategies
by different individuals and groups who try to achieve a common
social goal). Details on this conference will be available in
the autumn in the form of a CD-ROM.
Miguel Yasuyuki Hirota
mig@lime.plala.or.jp
http://www3.plala.or.jp/mig
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