RDP

[Guest guest]

Dear all,

 

PAMHO. AGTSP.

 

First, thankyou Chayadevi for your encouragement.

Second, it would be nice to have more of the cow

conference devotees put there piece forward. In my

case, I am presently unemployed in the UK with loads

of time on my hands and a body of knowledge, skills

and ideas that I have been wanting to work upon for a

long time. So please forgive my excessiveness in

aiding in the formation of the RDP. But I would like

more critical participation from others involved here

to offset my input.

 

>From Chayadevi,

 

> I see what you are saying about the preliminary

> statement being one

> paragraph so I have adjusted it.

> So we have the WHY, WHAT,VISION

>

> WHY

> To reinvigorate ISKCON farm communities in

> accordance

> with the wishes of His

> Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada,

> the

> ISKCON Ministry of Cow

> Protection and Agriculture presents a Rural

> Development Plan to establish sustainable

> principles and practices of land use that encourage

> participation in

> lifetime-protected cow-based agriculture

> and provides lifestyle security for the

> participants.

> >

> WHAT

> The ISKCON Rural Development Plan is to follow the

> structure of a mainstream

> Sustainability Development Plan. Sustainability

> development plans are used across the range

> of civil society - in Governments, Non-governmental

> Organizations (NGOs) and in Business.

> They have a logical structure that is not only easy

> to follow

> but also easy to translate from a solely ISKCON

> concern into a more

> secular concern. The structure of the ISKCON Rural

> Development Plan as

> a Sustainable Development Plan is as follows:

> 1) It is to be Sustainable, therefore it must

> balance

> environmental, social and economic land-use

> issues as part of the spiritual instructions

> outlined

> by Srila Prabhupada;

> 2) It is to follow a development process delineating

> the

> starting position we are in (A), the end

> result we want to see (Z), and the means to get from

> A

> to Z;

> 3) It is to outline a coherent and concise Vision

> backed up with timely and practicable

> Mission Statements with their subsequent detailed

> Action Plans.

>

>

> VISION

> The Vision is to establish ISKCON farms that manage

> according to established

> sustainable principles and practices of land use

> that encourage

> participation in lifetime-protected cow-based

> agriculture and provide

> lifestyle security for the farmers.

 

 

 

> >The bottom-up, meaning each and

> > every farm, would see a clear development process,

> > varied models to adopt to succeed, and would in

> > themselves be inspired to adapt to and adopt

> various

> > practices that are being shown.

>

> This has been the idea. The idea is to inspire in

> this case, this is not a

> case of enforcing even if the assets were there to

> do so. When this passes

> as ISKCON Law a devotee can bring it to his/her

> authorities and say I'd like

> to do this please facilitate, it is ISKCON Law.

>

> > The first step then would be to create the

> statistical

> > framework and then for a generalised audit, based

> on

> > the framework, of present farms via the

> participants

> > on the conference. This would then give a

> generalised

> > picture of our starting point(s) - A (B,C).

>

> Please suggest something.

 

 

The three criteria are environmental (specifically

land use principles and practices of

lifetime-protected cow-based agriculture), social

(specifically supply-side production (the farmer) and

demand-side consumption (the consumer)), and economic

(specifically short-term and long-term viablity of

both the system and in particular the workers to

achieve lifestyle remuneration).

 

During the last few months we have had a reasonable

amount of information shared about these criteria on

this conference. I am sure for the past N years you

have had much more. We do not need to have a wide and

detailed audit of all ISKCON farms, we should work

with the devotees on this conference to audit there

farms and therefore start the A,B,C scale to find best

practices and benchmark criteria. This I don't feel

will be problematic. The first step though, as I see

it, is to get the framework agreed upon, which means

finding specific qualities within the above env, soc,

econ criteria, quantifying them and observing their

interactions thus giving each criteria a different

waiting.

 

For example, shown below is a list of detailed

criteria, but which are the most important criteria?

Is it production per year, profit, workers employed,

staff remuneration, amount of cows and oxen, amount of

working cows and oxen, amount of milk produced, price

of milk and ox-powered-derived crops, amount of

production donated to the dieties, the percent of

forest cover, the amount of land owned or rented, the

amount of grant aid given by public or charitable

purse, the amount of funds secured in the land trust?

 

So many criteria, so many differences of importance.

If we go down the development road that is being

suggested then the above, finding the criteria to

place in a weighted framework, will be much of our

work.

 

My suggestions, though highly incomplete and

unstructured:

 

Environmental: Land use principles and practices of

lifetime-protected cow-based agriculture - initial

work outlined in Standards. Major work to look at -

increasing production and productivity in terms of

land and cow/ox. Land - to use land in a sustainable

form that will in the long term increase fertility and

bio-diversity, whilst at the same time producing for

the short and longterm needs of the participants. Key

issues beyond the Standards - agroforestry,

agro-ecology, permaculture (all basically the same

thing), organic or biological farming, biodynamics,

food quality, water resource management.

 

Social:

Supply-side production - the farmer. Means for the

farmer to produce and manage land whilst earning a

living. Key forms - working as self sufficient, CSA or

in a stand-alone enterprise. Key issues - productivity

per worker, skills, knowledge, ability, training,

workers rights, remuneration, land security, health

insurance, pensions, etc. Partnerships between CSAs,

charities, public or enterprises - linking with

existing organic farmers to form joint ventures.

 

Demand-side consumption - linking the consumer to the

producer via a market mechanism, either CSA or

straight purchase. ISKCON should look at Temple and

Restaurant Supported Agriculture (TSA & RSA), as that

was most definately in Prabhupada's instructions, and

also in the Standards. In fact the latter could lead

CSA as it provides an 'incentive and subsidy' base for

the intial experiments to be made in setting up a

yearly cropping system.

 

Economic - specifically short-term and long-term

viablity of both the system and in particular the

workers to achieve lifestyle remuneration.

Assets, liabilities, cashflows, profits, losses, land

trust endowments, pay structures, dividends, etc.

Ratios between land (cows), labour and secured capital

as backing. Complex formulae of present inputs and

future returns - main example is breeding to mature

herd (present gain, future liability) and forestry

(present loss, future gain).

 

 

Obviously, there is a lot of work to be done to create

a simple audit framework to garner a sliding scale of

development. Whilst many of us here may have real

experience working the land, there may be few who have

the development training to develop this system. I

only have training with little experience of

implimenting it. I am hoping Ananda Maya and others

have what it takes. Otherwise and notwithstanding, I

do not feel it a bad idea to seek funding to take our

plan to a professional in Environmental Management

Systems (ISO 14001) for analysis (I am hoping to start

a masters in this in April). There are groups all over

the place, who with lesser ambitions and plans seek

and gain good funding for their work and pay well

their employees. This should be the case here.

Balahbadra Prabhu and others should never have to work

as they do. We need to secure funding in the medium to

long term and take this into the professional arena.

 

Mark

 

 

 

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