Slow Money Movement

SLOW MONEY:

“Thousands of Americans have begun affirming a new direction for the food system and the economy. It’s called Slow Money.

Inspired by the vision of Inquiries into the Nature of Slow Money: Investing As If Food, Farms and Fertility Mattered, published in 2009, the Slow Money Alliance is bringing people together around a new conversation about money that is too fast, about finance that is disconnected from people and place, about how we can begin fixing our economy from the ground up, starting with food.”

Read more here:

http://www.slowmoney.org/

http://www.slowmoney.org/vision

http://www.slowmoney.org/principles

December 2009 article from OutskirtsPress:

http://www.alternet.org/health/144721?page=entire

From National Public Radio: This piece is from 2009 but it is still interesting and informative:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=101794001



My two cents: I am inspired by the Slow Money movement. While Slow Money may not be the answer to everything and it may not work in all situations, I do think Slow Money is an exciting addition to the usual financial arrangements. I have participated in two Slow Money projects in my local area and they have proved to be quite successful. These Slow Money projects enabled two businesses ( a local food co-op and a local sheep farm/cheese making business) to move forward, expand and succeed, something they would not otherwise have been able to do either because they could not obtain traditional financing (the sheep farm/cheese making business) or full traditional financing (the food co-op. I am interested to know how others feel about Slow Money and/or if others have had experience with the movement.

Hi Tigger,

I'm pretty slow myself, but I haven't been part of any slow movements. (I eat lots of fresh fruits.) I looked on Appropedia and didn't see much about it there either. Probably the most likely place to find others involved would be the Kiva Green Partnerships lending team (no lending necessary).

I added some info below from Wikipedia about the Slow Movement in general.

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Slow Movement
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Slow Movement advocates a cultural shift toward slowing down life's pace. It began with Carlo Petrini's protest against the opening of a McDonald's restaurant in Piazza di Spagna, Rome in 1986 that sparked the creation of the Slow Food organization. Over time, this developed into a subculture in other areas, such as Cittaslow (Slow Cities), Slow living, Slow Travel, and Slow Design.

Geir Berthelsen and his creation of The World Institute of Slowness presented a vision in 1999 for an entire 'Slow Planet' and a need to teach the world the way of Slow.

Professor Guttorm Fløistad summarizes the philosophy, stating:

The only thing for certain is that everything changes. The rate of change increases. If you want to hang on you better speed up. That is the message of today. It could however be useful to remind everyone that our basic needs never change. The need to be seen and appreciated! It is the need to belong. The need for nearness and care, and for a little love! This is given only through slowness in human relations. In order to master changes, we have to recover slowness, reflection and togetherness. There we will find real renewal.

The Slow Movement is not organized and controlled by a single organization. A fundamental characteristic of the Slow Movement is that it is propounded, and its momentum maintained, by individuals that constitute the expanding global community of Slow. Although it has existed in some form since the Industrial Revolution its popularity has grown considerably since the rise of Slow Food and Cittaslow in Europe, with Slow initiatives spreading as far as Australia and Japan.

Contents
1 Slow Food
2 Slow Gardening
3 Slow Money
4 Cittaslow
5 Slow Parenting
6 Slow Travel
7 Slow Art
8 Slow Media
9 Slow Fashion
10 Slow Software Development
11 Slow Goods

See also
African time
Carl Honoré
In Praise of Slow
Simple living
Slow architecture
Slow design
Slow living
Slow reading
Slow Sex Movement
Slowth
Slowcore (music)
World Sauntering Day (June 19)