permaculture

[KNat <knat@sprintmail.com>]

I've had mixed relationships with ecotourism for decades now, starting 
with water rights negotiations for reservations including access to 
tourism in the deals in SW US in the early 70s. I still dabble with 
entrepreneurs wanting better than casino clientèle to interact with on 
"their" lands. I will state, I am not a golfer and right now barely 
involved in directly generating gold. I rely on other people having more 
money than their ethics allow them to spend on their personal lifestyle 
or, at least, having a lifestyle that includes sharing gold with me for 
health and happiness. But, to me, less powerful countries positioning 
themselves to have part of the world harvest by converting land from 
growing food to harvesting foreign money is understandable. The people 
reaching out to welcome them into world finance include both global 
planners and snake oil salesmen. Of course there is the age old question 
of who gets to sell/control land none of us own.
As I look at golf courses having to "green" for their consumers with 
today's media campaign. They're full of niches to maintain locals. The 
"organic" golf course here is maintained by people who prefer to work 
outdoors, using compost tea from local sources. The restaurant serves 
organic cuisine from local small farms who can get the freshness they 
desire to them.  As long as we're using gold currency we need ways to do 
local harvests. Flying money sources around and "entertaining" them is 
an alternative to warring with our neighbors. Not that I think the world 
can support a lot of people of that dollar level, but isn't the other 
side, the golf courses are where we keep them. Kinda ants & aphids. We 
just can't let them get too dense or the plant(planet) suffers.
But, on politics, how can we support newly developing nations developing 
without debts requiring more gold than they can generate. Economies 
based on real worth of their land use. If the farms are reduced to less 
and less area, food should be a better commodity than gold. But we need 
methodology to do per calorie instead of "market" value.

Kathyann