As of mid August I had not a speck of Asia on my global radar- Weeks later I was fast-tracking Empowerment Works’ initiative of turning our founding approach into a universal curriculum for Sustainable Development, and now week and a day into Module 3 (out of 8 in a year) of the World Academy for the Future of Women,  officially titled, “Seven Stages to Sustainability”.

Tomorrow, marking week 2 of EW’s “Change Maker Media Series” I will host the China debut the  of “Vanishing of the Bees” - followed by insights from an environmental scholarship winner into the session’s theme: Climate Change, Biodiversity, & Food Security.

More to come SOON, this is my first post- getting thru to Blogs and uplinking media is not to be taken forgranted here.  XieXie, m

ps. for overview on China project: www.empowermentworks.org/china.html

New technologies power world’s first completely CO2 neutral music festival.

As the world (or at least a small fraction of the world) looks forward to  2009 UN Climate Change Conferenence in Copenhagen- COP15 (Dec. 7-18, 2009), a group of eco-technologists set forth a new record in producing a 100% carbon neutral music festival.

Marie Sauer-Johansen reports ( Sept. 15,2009 15:25): The Technical University of Denmark houses CO2penhagen , the first festival in the world to rely completely on sustainable energy produced on location.

“We want to demonstrate green technologies in new ways. The technologies we need already exist – not only are we CO2-neutral, we actually produce more energy than we need” says journalist Katrine Vejby, who has organised the festival in collaboration with the university.  …Read more

The Tribes of North and South America have been gathering in councils and encuentros for thousands of years, and in that tradition, the Continental Bioregional Congress has been a gathering of the environmental, social and native movements since the first Continental Bioregional Congress in1984.

Continental Congresses have brought together earth natives from all generations in sacred celebration and deep connection with the earth and our diverse human family. The 10th Continental Bioregional Congress (CBCX) will be a landmark event focused on unifying and strengthening the global effort to preserve, restore and enhance life. Individuals and organizations participating in the Congress will envision, exchange and spark realistic, restorative strategies for living in the bioregions of the Americas.

This year’s Congress, to be held at The Farm community in middle Tennessee, will spark and strengthen ecological and social networks to exchange information, strategies, and approaches about how to forge meaningful lives in balance with our local ecosystems and communities.

  This nine day residential event will include a bioregional certification curriculum, small and large group discussions and activities, a youth program and a toolbox of workshops and speakers focused on building, sustaining and re-localizing communities, reinvigorating culture and arts and organizing for ecological restoration, economic prosperity and policy change.

FOR PROGRAM DETAILS, FEES, & REGISTRATION, CLICK HERE.

(UNDP) More than halfway to the 2015 deadline to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), major advances in the fight against poverty and hunger have begun to slow or even reverse as a result of the global economic and food crises, a progress report by the United Nations has found. The assessment, launched by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in Geneva, warns that, despite many successes, overall progress has been too slow for most of the targets to be met by 2015. * Full text of the Report

(EW) Rising up to help turn the tide, EW is pre-planning for The Global Summit 2010, and developing its first online courses to disseminate community building & collaboration tools, including “7 Stages to Sustainability” and collaborative Tele-Summits (seminars) uniting 6 PIE Sectors around key issues including health & the new green economy.

Request Invite for EW online courses & Tele-Summits - Sept/ Oct ‘09.

The Sharing Solution is a practical and legal guide that guides you in making and maintaining successful sharing arrangements. From cars and tools to housing and childcare, this book will give you the tools and the how to for starting your own community of sharing.

First, we’re excited to announce that Humanity Uniting (click for pics) was a joyous success!

BIG thanks to our generous and talented Artists for donating their art, our sponsors 5th Floor Gallery, Han Asian Vodka, Transphushion Energy Drinks, Ride Amigos, Conscious River Media, 1 Giant Leap Productions, to our incredible volunteers, and extraordinary guests for celebrating and supporting EW! Special thanks to visionary event chair, Dana Arak for bringing the first “Humanity Uniting” to life. Together, we raised almost $3000 usd to sustain our programs! Stay tuned for the next “Artists in Action” event evolution!

Now we are pleased to share a handful of inspiration on the East Coast, LA & Bay Area!

Where ever this finds you we invite you to join our Partners In Empowerment in these remarkable, sustainable, socially uplifting events:

• May 16, 2009 - 2:00pm - SOS Climate Change Seminar

In a giant leap towards global sustainability, Empowerment Works is opening (max) 7 new Board of Director positions to lead The Global Summit (TGS) into 2010 and beyond.

QUALIFICATIONS:

1) Extraordinary level of personal and professional integrity.

2) Commitment to Empowerment Works’ holistic vision and programs.

3) Experience in (at least one): non-profit fund raising, HR management, organizational development, corporate board membership, hands on/ in-depth expertise in civic engagement, economics, sustainable development, human rights, media, PR, environmental consulting, community development, or field supporting global sustainability.

ANNUAL COMMITMENT:

1)  Monthly board meeting (physical or conference call).

2)  Chair or co-chair of one committee.

3)  Set & achieve personal fund raising goal.

THE PROCESS: 

1) Send Letter of Interest and CV/Resume to: info@empowermentworks.org

2) Initial candidates will be reviewed by May 13th, 2009.

3) If multiple candidates qualify, elections will be held with voting by EW’s Inspired Citizen list-serve, including EW supporters, grass-roots community partners, and The Global Summit 2008 founding Partners in Empowerment (PIE).

4) Final Board of Directors will be confirmed by May 30th, 2009!

For questions, call 310-392-6909 or e-mail: melanie@empowermentworks.org

We look forward to hearing from you!  YOUR PARTICIPATION IS VITAL!

A little background: Empowerment Works was recently introduced to the following model by Common Good Banks™ Community Organizer, Tober Schorr who EW’s director, Melanie St.James first met via speaking in his youth panel about AIDS and sustainability at the  2004 Sustainable Resources Conference in Boulder, CO.  Remarkably, they crossed paths again by staying in the same guest house in Mali, West Africa,January 2008!  After Tober’s 5 month trek across Africa, his enthusiastic involvement in Common Good Banks™ caught our attention-Good thing.  After an inspirational talk with President of Common Good Finance and Project Director, William Spademan, EW became a formal Bank partner and is actively advancing Common Good Banks as an economic foundation of EW’s flagship 7 Stage approach to building sustainable local communities. Please read on and let us know your thoughts!

Common Good Banks™ - A New Model for Economic Justice and Sustainability  by Common Good Banks™ Community Organizer, Tober Schorr

I consider myself to be a conscious, concerned citizen of Planet Earth who is willing to put in my time serving the greater good and make the necessary sacrifices so that my grandchildren will inherit a beautiful and just world.  But there are many social and environmental issues in our time, so many in fact that the sheer volume of work to be done can seem paralyzing.  I have noticed that all of these issues share one common thread: they are short on money.  One of the deepest-rooted problems in our society seems to be the way that money itself is created and distributed, and how this creates a profound imbalance in wealth and opportunity.  

Awareness is growing about the inequities of our current economic system.  There are many aspects of the way in which we exchange goods and services and the way we accumulate wealth that are problematic, and various new paradigms have been proposed to address the problems we face.

For example, local currency systems have been implemented in various communities.  Credit unions and other alternative sources of financing offer lower interest-rate options for major expenditures like purchasing a home.  And various community investment projects already exist to enhance the functioning of important public services. 

With all of this activity already going on in a complex world, why then another new model thrown into the mix? 

The common good bank model is a unique approach that combines scores of previously existing good ideas into a new, holistic model that uses grassroots community organizing to address several of the systemic shortfalls of our current economic paradigm simultaneously.  Organized as a stock bank, these new community banks will have the flexibility that credit unions lack.  However, all profit will be channeled back to the local community and deserving projects abroad.  Participants will be able to create money at the community level, providing stability in the face of constant inflation of the dollar.  And all of these community-based banks will be directed in a highly functional democratic process by the local depositors, with voting based on a one-person-one-vote principle rather than by amount of stock held.

Sound good?

Help make it happen!  Through May 15th we are hiring Community Division Organizers (CDOs) all over the United States at $10 an hour and up. CDOs work in their own community to form partnerships with local businesses and nonprofits and sign up future depositors. They also raise funds critical to the creation of a charter so that the first common good bank can be opened soon.

For more details, please visit our website:

http://www.commongoodbank.com/job

Serial award winning film-maker for change, Holly Mosher who is executive producing the EW project Vanishing of the Bees (www.vanishingbees.com) just got back from her latest trip to Bangladesh where she was following the work of Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus and the Grameen Bank. 

The documentary, which profiles the array of diverse women’s triumphs and challenges is called

“Small Change - World of Difference” - with production company & website appropriately titled, Passion and Grit.

Holly Mosher reports:

“Spending time in Bangladesh has been eye-opening for me in so many ways.  It has been inspiring to see the work of the Grameen Bank and the potential to change lives with micro-credit loans, but it has also been so rewarding to get access into the lives of such open hearted and welcoming people. 

I was amazed by the success stories and also the level of patience and sharing I would see all around.  I was trying to understand how people in a place so overcrowded (it is the most densely populated country on earth) and susceptible to so many natural disasters could be so open and caring.

I was also so pleased spend time in a Muslim country and see how welcoming they were to Americans.  And I could see how in this country people might actually be better off having the arranged marriages, so that they would have a support system as soon as they leave their own families.  It started to all make a lot more sense for me.

 
The biggest thing I’ve been proud to witness is how the Grameen Bank is truly helping to bring equality and a higher status to the women of Bangladesh.  I felt that for women in Bangladesh, it must be how it was for women here in the early of the 19th century.  But whenever a Grameen borrower took out a housing loan, she’d have to get the title to the house first.  

It was also impressive to see how the bank made sure that all borrowers started making weekly deposits into their savings accounts.  I think we could learn a lot from the entire process of the bank and how they are teaching very simple money management skills and as a result raising women’s standards of living and helping them forge their equality.

If we are listening, we could learn a lot from the Grameen Companies, who are finding creative solutions with everything from banking to healthcare to alternative energies.”

To learn more/ see project updates, visit:  www.passionandgrit.com