Mike's Thai counterpart, Pe Chai, effectively "greened" his community's entire economy by finding a way to make organic farming profitable and then organize all of his neighbors to do it too. As a result, he was able to create a organic farmer's union that represented 83 families and with enough farm product bulk to export their goods directly to Europe and Asia without the help of a middleman, which increased the average family's profits by over 50 percent.
Also, the profits from the organic farming business has increased the tax base of the community. Therefore, more money has also flowed into daycares, school, local health clinics, elderly groups, and other community assistance programs.
Moreover, just about every job in his village is based on organic farming. There are the actual farmers who grow and harvest the corn, rice, peanuts, etc. and then they have a bunch of small food manufacturers that make banana chips, peanut snacks, and other small packaged goods. They also invested in their infrastructure by building a brand new storage facility and rice mill. His village's local economy is booming and he is doing his part to help the environment.
This is an example of the power of using community organizing to create value, and not simply extract something or redistribute the same resources. Pe Chai took a community strength (farming) and applied it in a new way to meet a specific need in the marketplace (organic foodstuffs) to create even more value (essentially grow the pie) for his community to export to the world.
Oh! I have pictures this time too!!
Organic lettuce heads in the field
Pe Chai outside of the banana chip manufacturing
plant.
Mike outside of the new storage facility
The brand new rice mill
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