The new Model Explained - Overview
The Big Picture
Our focus in the early days has been on a single global currency called Seeds. Over time, this vision has been challenged by all of the different learnings we’ve received - from the community, from the experts and from our own understanding of how currencies actually work.
We are now ready to throw off our blinders and myoptic views of the past and move into the next phase, entering a much larger socio-ecological context that engages with multiple forces through multiple types of currencies (a family of Seeds).
The Seeds Family of Currencies
"Seeds" has given birth to a new generation of currencies: the Seeds Currency Family Tree:
To put the above chart into more context, think about a cascading value flow between global markets, ecosystems and (hyper)local communities. They each co-depend on each other, amplify each other and provide the means to build healthy and thriving relationships.
The Global Market Context
This is where Seeds is most vulnerable to open market forces.
Growth patterns are inorganic, top down and highly volatile in this space. In that respect, Seeds is different and has two more contexts to operate in, the Ecosystem Context (or Supply Chain), acting as a “Buffer Zone” and anchored in the middle between open market forces and the third context of (hyper)local market places.
The Constant Transfer Context
This context is most related to the original vision of Seeds and the revised editions, namely the design of Constant Seeds. It is a buffer zone that introduces stability in a volatile market and prepares the ground for the application of Seeds in (hyper)local contexts.
In a world threatened by accelerating inflation, Constant Seeds offers a place for people to safeguard their purchasing power by offsetting the cost of inflation in their respective regions.
Since the USD, Euros and other fiat currencies are inflationary currencies, the relative price of Constant Seeds in fiat currencies will still go up over time, due to the fiat currencies inflation rate. This is because the purchasing power of the USD and other fiat currencies is actually going down.
The (Hyper)local Context
This is where the currency hits to road and finds its application in hundreds of hyperlocal pilots across the globe. While the other currencies might be linear, the currency of the (hyper)local context must be circular from the get go. Its growth patterns are organic, whereby each community will experience the currency in a different way finding different adoption patterns to make it successful. Possible patterns are Barter Trade, Mutual Credit, Contribution Accounting or Open Money and many more.
The Seeds Tokens
Market Seeds, also called "gSeeds" - Ticker Symbol: SEEDS
SEEDS Members buying this token (from “SEEDS Commons”) are contributing to the working capital and growth of the Seeds Community around the world. We want its price to be a “proxy” for the success and health of the SEEDS ecosystem. It is not a perfect proxy but the best approximation of one.
Since the Commons can mint gSeeds to cover its working capital and the funding of regenerative projects in community currencies (oSeeds), it will also serve as a source of funding for this purpose. The Commons will telegraph in advance its usual pattern of minting gSeeds, it is expected this will not significantly alter the price of the trading Seeds (gSeeds).
This token is a utility token, a funding path to distribute working capital to the entire ecosystem. Staking this token opens up Harvest (a share of the growth of the entire ecosystem) to be distributed to token holders.
Constant Seeds, also called "cSeeds" - Ticker Symbol: CSEEDS
The Constant Seeds token is unique and global and defined to be independent of the cost of inflation. This token is intended to have “constant purchasing power” over time.
The Constant Seeds token is the natural currency for global marketplaces to assist in constant pricing.
These tokens also provide a service to the ecosystem as they connect communities together. Each and every transfer event moving cSeeds from account-A to account-B is happening to facilitate an equal value transfer the other direction. This is a “trade”.
Community Seeds, also called "oSeeds"
These are (hyper)local Seeds serving a single community where the people in that community have a relationship with each other. A community is typically physically local, but it may be possible that, in some instances, communities emerge around a common purpose across different territories.
Each community can create their own Seeds token; their version of Seeds that best supports their purpose. These local tokens are serving the economic circulation within the boundary of the community.
They derive inherent value from the bonds that define the community, and they can choose a range of “backing” options as might be felt to be useful. The purpose of any such “backing” is to create a strong sense of trust and reliability in the token for use in their community. These tokens could be issued via UBI or in response to inserting "resourced" collectively deemed to be valuable to the community.
They should be primarily “non-transferable” outside of the (hyper)local community that issued them. A relationship with Constant Seeds ("Liquidity Bridge") will be designed to meter flow in and out of each community, so as to be in balance and sustainable.
The Governance
In order to make this approach successful, we needed the various currency experts within the SEEDS Community to come together and define the new currency model for SEEDS.
We therefore needed an officially recognised workgroup, the Seeds Currency Working Group, that is firmly embedded in the SEEDS ecosystem. The best place to coordinate this (and other) working group(s) is through the SEEDS Commons as a series of independent entities/quests (see top right in the diagram below). Membership in the Seeds Currency Working Group is by invitation and open to anyone inside the SEEDS community.
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