Terra (currency)
The Terra (from the Latin terra : "earth", "land") is the name of a possible world currency first published in 1933 .
The Terra currency is said to be based on a basket of goods made up of the twelve most important goods and services (measured by their importance in world trade ). The basic concept was first published on January 1, 1933 in the French newspaper Le Fédériste . At that time the idea was born to create a " L'Europa - monnaie de la paix " (German: "Europe - money of peace").
The historical shopping cart
The standardized shopping cart, dating from 1933, should be composed as follows:
- 30 hundredths of gold , equivalent to 300 milligrams of gold
- 2 kilograms of grain
- 200 grams of meat
- 1 liter of wine
- 3 kilograms of steel
- 200 grams of cotton
- 200 grams of copper
- 1 kilometer ton , the cost of transporting one ton of goods over a distance of one kilometer
- 10 kilowatt hours
- half an hour of work - depending on the respective country's productivity ( gross national product )
Rediscovery
As part of a study trip on March 27, 1999, the historical idea was enthusiastically received by the Belgian economist Bernard A. Lietaer and has since represented it and occasionally discussed again in professional circles. In the opinion of Bernard A. Lietaer, the Terra would be an inflation-proof currency. In addition, this complementary currency would significantly simplify the global exchange of goods .
Further development
The basic idea of the Terra currency is to show the most important goods used and traded worldwide in a weighted standardized shopping basket. The weighting is based on the importance of the respective good. The further subdivision of the standardized shopping cart is fractal . Fractality means using the principle for the whole basket and for each subunit. Current definitions of the Terra in turn represent weighted basket definitions in the individual components of the basket. The “half working hour” then consists (analogously) of twelve seconds of Swiss working time or three minutes of Chinese working time, whereby the current local productivity is taken into account. The transport costs would therefore have to be allocated to all countries, weighted according to their global importance, and again weighted country-by-country according to means of transport.
Another concept of a global currency is called Globo .
criticism
One of the criticisms of the Terra currency is that the historical basket of goods is “too imprecisely” defined. For example, because the form of transport is not differentiated in the historical shopping cart, whether a kilometer ton is the cost of transport by truck , cargo ship or cargo plane . However, the fact that this is a basis for discussion is not recognized, since the use of the shopping basket from the 1933 proposal is anachronistic . Especially since it has to be considered that the majority of the transport in 1933 was carried out on railroad tracks anyway.
Another point of criticism is the complex implementation. Worldwide standardization would meet considerable resistance. The fears are that the traditional use of local currencies and thus an identity of the nations will be lost. As with the development of the euro , this problem could be addressed with localized coins .
Furthermore, proponents of a global currency see it only as a global network made up of a large number of currencies that, for example, circulate for specific purposes or regionally. This large number of currencies should make the economy system more stable and less prone to crises. Terra enables global trade.
literature
- Bernard A. Lietaer: The mystery of money, emotional meaning and the mode of action of a taboo. Translated by Heike Schlatterer. German first edition, Riemann Verlag, Munich 2000.
- Bernard A. Lietaer: The money of the future - About the destructive effect of our monetary system and alternatives to it . (Original title: The Future of Money, translated from English by Heike Schlatterer, Ursel Schäfer) Riemann Verlag, Munich 2002, ISBN 3-570-50035-7
- Margrit Kennedy, Bernard A. Lietaer: Regional currencies - new ways to sustainable prosperity. Translated by Elisabeth Liebl. Original edition, Riemann Verlag, Munich 2004. ISBN 978-3-570-50052-1
Web links
- TerraTRC (English) - website about the idea of the currency Terra (archived version of August 11, 2015, official website is offline)
- Access Foundation (English) - "Alliance of Complementary Currencies Enabling Sustainable Societies"
Individual evidence
- ^ A b L'Europa / die Europa - the money of peace . Unterguggenberg Institute, October 8, 2006
- ↑ The Europe - Money of Peace . Short article by Vero on Bernard A. Lietaer's study trip to the Unterguggenberg Institute on October 4, 2006