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Local Exchange Trading System
A local exchange trading system (also local employment and trading system or local energy transfer system; abbreviated LETS) is a locally initiated, democratically organised, not-for-profit community enterprise that provides a community information service and records transactions of members exchanging goods and services by using locally created currency."LETSystems Training Pack", (1990) W.A. Government. LETS allow people to negotiate the value of their own hours or services, and to keep wealth in the locality where it is created. Similar trading systems around the world are also known as Community Exchange Systems (CES), Mutual Credit trading systems, Clearing Circles, Trade Exchanges or Time Banks. These all use 'metric currencies' – currencies that ''measure'', as opposed to the fiat currencies used in conventional value exchange. Each of these value transfer systems functions as a complementary currency. In the 21st century, the internet-based networks have been us ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Community Exchange System
The Community Exchange System (CES) is an internet-based global trading network which allows participants to buy and sell goods and services without using a Fiat money, national currency. It may be described as a type of local exchange trading system (LETS) network based on free software. While it can be used as an alternative to traditional currencies such as the Australian dollar or euro or South African rand, the ''Community Exchange System'' is a complementary currency in the sense that it functions alongside established currencies. The CES name was coined by an online web service which started in 2003 in Cape Town, South Africa, as the Cape Town Talent Exchange (CTTE). From there it spread to 99 countries, with the biggest take-up in Australia, where CES Australia was founded in 2011. This original CES takes the idea of LETS and similar systems a step further by providing the means for inter-community trading; it is a global network of communities using non-monetary exchange ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Timebanking
In economics, a time-based currency is an alternative currency or exchange system where the unit of account is the person-hour or some other time unit. Some time-based currencies value everyone's contributions equally: one hour equals one service credit. In these systems, one person volunteers to work for an hour for another person; thus, they are credited with one hour, which they can redeem for an hour of service from another volunteer. Others use time units that might be fractions of an hour (e.g. minutes, ten minutes – 6 units/hour, or 15 minutes – 4 units/hour). While most time-based exchange systems are service exchanges in that most exchange involves the provision of services that can be measured in a time unit, it is also possible to exchange goods by 'pricing' them in terms of the average national hourly wage rate (e.g. if the average hourly rate is $20/hour, then a commodity valued at $20 in the national currency would be equivalent to 1 hour). History 19th century ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ethiopia
Ethiopia, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country located in the Horn of Africa region of East Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the north, Djibouti to the northeast, Somalia to the east, Kenya to the south, South Sudan to the west, and Sudan to the northwest. Ethiopia covers a land area of . , it has around 128 million inhabitants, making it the List of countries and dependencies by population, thirteenth-most populous country in the world, the List of African countries by population, second-most populous in Africa after Nigeria, and the most populous landlocked country on Earth. The national capital and largest city, Addis Ababa, lies several kilometres west of the East African Rift that splits the country into the African Plate, African and Somali Plate, Somali tectonic plates. Early modern human, Anatomically modern humans emerged from modern-day Ethiopia and set out for the Near East and elsewhere in the Middle Paleolithi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cameroon
Cameroon, officially the Republic of Cameroon, is a country in Central Africa. It shares boundaries with Nigeria to the west and north, Chad to the northeast, the Central African Republic to the east, and Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and the Republic of the Congo to the south. Its coastline lies on the Bight of Biafra, part of the Gulf of Guinea, and the Atlantic Ocean. Due to its strategic position at the crossroads between West Africa and Central Africa, it has been categorized as being in both camps. Cameroon's population of nearly 31 million people speak 250 native languages, in addition to the national tongues of English and French, or both. Early inhabitants of the territory included the Sao civilisation around Lake Chad and the Baka people (Cameroon and Gabon), Baka hunter-gatherers in the southeastern rainforest. Portuguese discoveries, Portuguese explorers reached the coast in the 15th century and named the area ''Rio dos Camarões'' (''Shrimp River''), which became ''C ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Botswana
Botswana, officially the Republic of Botswana, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Botswana is topographically flat, with approximately 70 percent of its territory part of the Kalahari Desert. It is bordered by South Africa to the south and southeast, Namibia to the west and north, Zambia to the north, and Zimbabwe to the northeast. With a population of slightly over 2.4 million people and a comparable land area to France, Botswana is one of the List of countries and dependencies by population density, most sparsely populated countries in the world. It is essentially the nation-state of the Tswana people, who constitute nearly 80 percent of the population. The Tswana ethnic group are descended mainly from Bantu peoples, Bantu-speaking peoples who Bantu expansion, migrated into southern Africa, including modern Botswana, in several waves before AD 600. In 1885, the British Empire, British colonised the area and declared a protectorate named Bechuanaland. As part of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Utopia
A utopia ( ) typically describes an imagined community or society that possesses highly desirable or near-perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book ''Utopia (book), Utopia'', which describes a fictional island society in the New World. Hypothetical utopias focus on, among other things, equality in categories such as economics, government and justice, with the method and structure of proposed implementation varying according to ideology. Lyman Tower Sargent argues that the nature of a utopia is inherently contradictory because societies are not homogeneous and have desires which conflict and therefore cannot simultaneously be satisfied. To quote: The opposite of a utopia is a dystopia. Utopian and dystopian fiction has become a popular literary category. Despite being common parlance for something imaginary, utopianism inspired and was inspired by some reality-based fields and concepts such as utopian architecture, architecture, Cyber-ut ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quality Of Life
Quality of life (QOL) is defined by the World Health Organization as "an individual's perception of their position in life in the context of the culture and value systems in which they live and in relation to their goals, expectations, standards and concerns". Standard indicators of the quality of life include wealth, employment, the environment, physical and mental health, education, recreation and leisure time, social belonging, religious beliefs, safety, security and freedom. QOL has a wide range of contexts, including the fields of international development, healthcare, politics and employment. Health related QOL (HRQOL) is an evaluation of QOL and its relationship with health. Engaged theory One approach, called the engaged theory, outlined in the journal of ''Applied Research in the Quality of Life'', posits four domains in assessing quality of life: ecology, economics, politics and culture. In the domain of culture, for example, it includes the following subd ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Non-profit Organization
A nonprofit organization (NPO), also known as a nonbusiness entity, nonprofit institution, not-for-profit organization, or simply a nonprofit, is a non-governmental (private) legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public, or social benefit, as opposed to an entity that operates as a business aiming to generate a Profit (accounting), profit for its owners. A nonprofit organization is subject to the non-distribution constraint: any revenues that exceed expenses must be committed to the organization's purpose, not taken by private parties. Depending on the local laws, charities are regularly organized as non-profits. A host of organizations may be non-profit, including some political organizations, schools, hospitals, business associations, churches, foundations, social clubs, and consumer cooperatives. Nonprofit entities may seek approval from governments to be Tax exemption, tax-exempt, and some may also qualify to receive tax-deductible contributions, but an enti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Community
A community is a social unit (a group of people) with a shared socially-significant characteristic, such as place, set of norms, culture, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given geographical area (e.g. a country, village, town, or neighborhood) or in virtual space through communication platforms. Durable good relations that extend beyond immediate genealogical ties also define a sense of community, important to people's identity, practice, and roles in social institutions such as family, home, work, government, TV network, society, or humanity at large. Although communities are usually small relative to personal social ties, "community" may also refer to large-group affiliations such as national communities, international communities, and virtual communities. In terms of sociological categories, a community can seem like a sub-set of a social collectivity. In developmental views, a community can emerge out of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Community Building
Community building is a field of practices directed toward the creation or enhancement of community among individuals within a regional area (such as a neighborhood) or with a common need or interest. It is often encompassed under the fields of community organizing, community organization, community practice, community work, and community development. A wide variety of practices can be utilized/implemented to define culture for community development/building, ranging from simple events like potlucks and small Book discussion club, book clubs, to larger–scale efforts such as mass festivals and building construction projects that involve local participants rather than outside contractors. Activists and Community practice, community workers engaged in community building efforts in Developed country, industrialized nations see the apparent loss of community in these societies as a key cause of social disintegration and the emergence of many harmful behaviors. They may see buildi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mortgage Loan
A mortgage loan or simply mortgage (), in civil law (legal system), civil law jurisdictions known also as a hypothec loan, is a loan used either by purchasers of real property to raise funds to buy real estate, or by existing property owners to raise funds for any purpose while putting a lien on the property being mortgaged. The loan is "collateral (finance), secured" on the borrower's property through a process known as mortgage origination. This means that a Mortgage law, legal mechanism is put into place which allows the lender to take possession and sell the secured property ("foreclosure" or "repossession") to pay off the loan in the event the borrower defaults on the loan or otherwise fails to abide by its terms. The word ''mortgage'' is derived from a Law French term used in Legal professions in England and Wales, Britain in the Middle Ages meaning "death pledge" and refers to the pledge ending (dying) when either the obligation is fulfilled or the property is taken throu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peter Baldwin (politician)
Peter Jeremy Baldwin (born 12 April 1951) is a former Australian politician. He was a member of the House of Representatives from 1983 to 1998, representing the seat of Sydney for the Australian Labor Party (ALP). He served as Minister for Social Security in the Keating government from 1993 to 1996. He was previously a member of the New South Wales Legislative Council from 1976 to 1982. Early life Baldwin was born in Aldershot, England. His family moved to Australia in 1958. He attended Normanhurst Boys High School in Sydney, and later received a Bachelor of Electrical Engineering from the University of Sydney and a Bachelor of Arts from Macquarie University. State politics Baldwin was a member of the New South Wales Legislative Council from 1976 to 1982. In the 1970s he was prominent as a left-wing activist in the Australian Labor Party (ALP). In the early morning hours of 17 July 1980, Baldwin assaulted at his home in the nearby Sydney suburb of Marrickville. Pictures o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
