Why I do what I do and why nature should matter to you too

Permaculture has a mantra regarding water: “Slow it, spread it, sink it”. When it rains, catch as much as you can, buffer it as long as you can and allow it to slowly enter the soil. In the last year I have learned so much more about sustainable food production practices, about how new financing techniques, crypto and blockchain work, and during the Kolektivo festival even more of where we see ourselves in a year. I want to talk a little bit more about the why we are doing this. Let me slow the flow of information down a bit, spread it in digestible parts and let the information sink in.

When you ask people about nature, usually their minds go to the lovely beaches, national parks and snorkeling spots we have on the island. Or, like these days, people mention the unpredictability of the weather, the possible hurricane threats, how rainy seasons used to be more defined or how it did not used to be so hot when they were younger. The fact that nature is changing is seen as an inconvenience, as something detached from us as human beings, not something life altering.

Nature is changing, climate change is and will remain a sensitive topic. One reason why it is sensitive, is because so much of what is changing is outside of our control. More extreme temperatures, more extreme weather events, what can we as tiny humans do? Biodiversity is declining, forests are disappearing, sea levels are rising, what is it to me?

What we should realize is that we as humans are a part of nature, of an ecosystem. According to the National Geographic Society:

“An ecosystem is a geographic area where plants, animals, and other organisms, as well as weather and landscape, work together to form a bubble of life. Ecosystems contain biotic or living, parts, as well as abiotic factors, or nonliving parts. Biotic factors include plants, animals, and other organisms.”

Source: National Geographic Society

That is us right there, under the ‘biotic factors’ umbrella. And what an ecosystem does, it offers us ecosystem services. Like clean air to breathe, fresh water to drink or even salty water to desalinate and drink, plants and animals to eat. Forests and oceans absorb CO2, offer us recreational options and offer medicines.

When our ecosystem degenerates, our way of life will come under pressure. Arable land will become scarce: with rising sea levels, populations will move to available land and with more extreme weather events crops become less certain. Food production is already under pressure: droughts and floods, diseases, political unrest, you can feel it in your pocket in the grocery store. With intensive agriculture, the quality of the soil declines. The crops that are produced have a lower caloric value, are less filling and nutritious.

When you go to a restaurant and get good service, you give a good tip. Why don’t we value the services that nature is giving us in a similar way? Why are we not putting more effort in making sure, that these life sustaining services are still around for generations to come?

Because that is the key. We don’t just want to sustain the life we are living, and hope that the next generation can do the same. We want to improve the way we are living and ensure that the next generations have the tools and handles to solve environmental decay. We are aiming for a regenerative way of live, restoring the system to improve the outcome.

That is why Kolektivo is backing ecological assets. We started with regenerative food systems, will continue with coral reefs and then move on to mangroves. These are crucial parts of our food chain, coastal protection and a source of potential medical and engineering material we can only start to comprehend.

And for that we need to put our money where our mouths are. You know, the ones you like to eat with. Regenerative food systems, as many other changemaking efforts, are struggling with lack of funding, a lot of skepticism and inadequate resources. We are working on the resources and are proving that it can be done, plot by plot.

When we add value to the building blocks of what we need to survive as a species, not only emotional value, and really start investing in it, you will see that the quality will increase. And then it will become more valuable intrinsically. It will start to become interesting to make and protect more of these building blocks. With regenerative food production becoming profitable, our island will become more self-sufficient. Our food more nutritious and accessible. More jobs will be created, more knowledge will spill over to other endeavors in the vicinity.

Because we don’t just want to survive, we want to thrive. We only have one Earth. Let us be the generation that uses new ideas and technology to tackle this inherited issue and tip the scales towards a regenerative future. Let us slow down the downward spiral, spread the knowledge and let good practices sink in and be our standard way of living.