Finance and Planning
ECONOMICS is the science and art of accessing affluence. The ideal of economics is for everyone in the whole world family to live abundance and fulfilment in daily life. This ideal is achieved by harnessing the infinite creativity and abundance of Total Natural Law available at every point in creation at the transcendental level of existence. This is the field of Total Knowledge of economics, available in the field of the science and technology of Total Natural Law, the Unified Field of all the Laws of Nature.
The Poverty Removal Program: Utilizing a Global Development Currency, the RAAM, to Develop the Unused Fertile Agricultural Land for Profitable Export of Organic Food
The Global Country of World Peace offers the complete knowledge of Natural Law available in Maharishi’s Vedic Science and Technology, which has been brought out to the world by His Holiness Maharishi Mahesh Yogi over the past 50 years.The Global Country of World Peace offers this complete knowledge of Natural Law to each field of life, including Economy, so that the leaders of the nation can take recourse to higher intelligence—the total Natural Law that peacefully administers the universe without a problem—to create a national government that is prevention-oriented and problem-free, and national and international life filled with good health, peace, harmony, prosperity and fulfillment.
In the field of Economy—the Global Country of World Peace offers Maharishi’s Poverty Removal Program, which utilizes a catalytic global development currency, the RAAM, to develop the unused fertile agricultural land available in the nation to produce pure nourishing food for export, grown according to the principles of Maharishi Vedic Organic Agriculture, fulfilling the great need of the world for better, healthier food free from poison, and earning sufficient income to increase the wealth of the poorest people in each society many times, and to provide them with good housing, health care and education.
This is essential for creating permanent world peace. Without eliminating poverty, peace will never be permanent. The basis of peace is satisfaction and fulfillment in the whole population.
The Raam, the Global Development Currency to Permanently Eliminate Poverty
The Poverty Removal Program has been developed to eliminate poverty and economic difficulties through national projects supported by a new development currency, the Raam.On the auspicious occasion of Vijaya Dashami, October 26, 2001, the Day of Victory according to the Vedic Calendar, Maharishi Global Financing, The Netherlands, issued the RAAM, the Global Development Currency of the Global Country of World Peace.
The RAAM will be made available to all the cities and countries of the world where it is welcome as a currency, in conformity with all the applicable rules and regulations of those countries.
Agreements have recently been made, for instance, with a farmers’ association in South America and with traditional leaders in Africa to start using the RAAM as the Farmers’ Currency for agricultural development projects. The RAAM will act as a catalyst in the field of economy, enabling the development projects to start, and transforming itself into hard currency after the export of the crops.
Financial Policy of the Poverty Removal Program: Utilizing the Global Development Currency, the Raam
On the basis of our knowledge of world economy, we have designed a new approach for removing poverty through the RAAM development currency.
The RAAM currency will provide the means to start the many productive projects that would otherwise not start for lack of money in the government treasury.
These projects may include development of nonpolluting industry, organic agriculture and agricultural processing, creation of new facilities to attract more eco-tourists, and development of the mineral wealth of the country in harmony with nature.
This economic proposal accords perfectly with every nation’s noble intention to have prosperity for every citizen and peace throughout the world.
The result of these projects will be a dramatic increase in foreign exchange earnings, and the employment of tens of thousands of citizens in well-paid jobs supported by export-oriented industries and farms.
Points for the Government to Apply the RAAM to Eliminate Poverty
1. Through its lawmaking authority, the government can make any law. This means the government can issue the Raam as a complementary currency to the national currency, and use it for the start up costs of developing uncultivated lands in your country, and to start other economic projects that will remove poverty, without any requirement of money from the national treasury.
2. The government may feel it has very little or no money for new economic projects. It is this understanding which is incorrect. This problem can be eliminated by the issuing of RAAM to pay the startup costs for the first two to three years of each project while it is becoming established and profitable. The national currency remains on its own basis untouched.
3. The RAAM Global Development Currency enables the economy to be developed without the use of either national or foreign currency, and without the feeling of lack of funds for any development project. The principle of removing poverty without spending the money of the government and without putting undue pressure of foreign currency loans on the government is the point of economic genius at the basis of the poverty removal program.
4. Almost every nation has great wealth in their land that remains undeveloped due to lack of money for startup costs. For example, there are hundreds of millions of hectares of unused, fertile agricultural land spread especially across the poorest countries of the world.
5. Developing this land—using the RAAM for the startup costs—for production of healthy food for export can produce billions in new income for the poor countries of the world. The wealthy countries that have spoiled their own land with poison are in desperate need of healthy food free from poison.
The demand for pure, nourishing, organic food in these countries is increasing at a very rapid pace, and will continue to expand faster and faster as the destructive effects on adults and especially on children of food grown with chemicals becomes clearer and clearer to everyone. The opportunities for the poorest countries to fill this need for healthy food are unlimited.
6. On average, each hectare of land in organic production may earn $3,000 in profits from exports per year. Even one million hectares of unused land put into production will produce $3 billion a year—enough to repay the startup costs of the project within a few years, and to maintain a high level of continuing support of a better quality of life for the poor year after year, and the glorification of all aspects of national life.
7. Maharishi Vedic Organic Agriculture is a system of agriculture that is both poison-free, and has the full vitality of Natural Law enlivened in it, making it the most healthful and nourishing of all food. Such ideal food is going to be in demand generation after generation. Producing it is the perfect way for the poor countries both to nourish their own people, and through export to create wealth for the nations throughout time.
8. We will start by engaging the farmers and giving them double the minimum wages in the country. No one even in the very poorest countries should earn less than $2,000 per annum. The RAAM may also be used to build good, comfortable villages for the poorest in society. They will begin to live comfortably in these villages right from the start of the project so that they enjoy a better quality of life right from day one. Farmers and other workers should also be protected from hard work; they will be trained to work less hours a day under comfortable, untiring conditions, avoiding the scorching heat of the midday sun and other unhealthy working conditions.
9. The global development currency RAAM is a catalytic currency. It need only be in circulation for two to three years to catalyze the start of an economically profitable project, and only be applicable to a specific area of the country where the project will be implemented. The RAAM will circulate only until the project begins to earn export income in foreign currency, and then it can be withdrawn. Consequently, it will not promote any sense of inflation in the country.
10. Some might claim that since there is no gold or other material asset backing up the issue of the complementary currency, it will lead to inflation. This is not a valid argument, because the RAAM is backed by material assets—the new and more profitable crops that can be grown in the nation’s precious soil, and the underutilized energy and creativity of the people of the nation.
11. The RAAM is a creative method of using the strength of the national treasury to realize these assets in the nation’s earth and the nation’s people, and convert them into hard currency and rapidly expanding national wealth and improved living conditions. The Raam currency is issued on the basis of the treasury of underground wealth of the nation, and its wealth of human creativity.
12. This principle of national development through RAAM is vital because the national treasury has been demoralized by having to borrow money from abroad, which always leads to a loss of national sovereignty, and by the sense that the national treasury is too weak to undertake any development projects without loans or assistance.
13. Our principle will be that if the RAAM development currency is the primary support for the development of the country, then the profits will remain in the country. When projects are started with outside investment and loans, the profits earned by the national creativity will finish up in the hands of the wealthy nations. When we bring the money for economic development from outside the country, then all profit goes outside for all time.
14. Equipment from abroad needed for these economic development projects can be imported on terms, and paid off over eight to ten years from the income of the project.
15. As part of the project, we are ready to establish an organic agricultural university so that the farmers may raise their social and economic status as they gain knowledge and experience in organic agriculture over the years, and receive diplomas and higher degrees from the university.
16. At least 1,000 workers involved in these new RAAM-based projects will also be trained as experts in Maharishi’s Transcendental Meditation and Yogic Flying—the Vedic technologies of consciousness which have been scientifically proven to create coherence and integration in national consciousness, resulting in increasing national peace, harmony and creativity, and more favorable economic trends in national life. This will enable the nation to become a lighthouse of peace and prosperity for all nations on earth.
Eradicating Poverty Without Having to Deplete the National Treasury
This whole concept of eradicating poverty without using any national currency has a great intellectual appeal; it will be practically demonstrated during the first three years of the project.
The land is there with its fertility; the people are there with their intelligence and creativity; the intention of the government is there to eradicate poverty; and expertise is there with us to fulfill the intention of the government without using the financial resources of the government, and without exposing the government treasury to the pressure and obligation of foreign currency loans.
As the project develops successfully, it will be tempting to develop other unused lands, and start other new projects, and completely eliminate poverty in the country.
Principles Upon Which the Poverty Removal Program Is Based
1. Start the program by first eradicating poverty; that means give the poor good housing and comfortable living from the very beginning of the program.
2. Reduce the working hours of the poor, giving them more time for spiritual or religious pursuits, according to their cultural heritage.
3. Educate the poor to increase their productivity so that they earn more while working fewer hours a day, and guide them to produce export-oriented products for maximum profit.
We will also organize the supply of air-conditioned tractors in order to reduce the fatigue of farming. This will give us the joy of alleviating poverty right from the beginning of the project. It is our joy to state that our program to eliminate poverty will be fulfilled at the start of the project, unlike any other project for which one has to wait for fulfillment until the project comes to an end.
The Poverty Removal Program is so beautifully designed that everyone who participates will obtain increasing profit year after year. Only, in the beginning, the project needs financial support to get started, and the global development currency, the RAAM, supplies that need.Alternatively, investors may like to provide start up funds, and take advantage of a large-scale, long-lasting business opportunity.
Glorifying the Nation with the Profits from the Project
Our program to eliminate poverty should also start to improve every area of national life. This will be financed by 25% of the profit of the project, year after year, starting after the third year.
Every aspect of poverty in the country will start to be eliminated in the following way:
• Construction of the most modern administrative buildings equipped with the latest electronic and computer technology equipment for ideal administration, so that fast communication and complete up-to-date information is available whenever desired, with the touch of a button, to the Head of State and his ministers, governors, and local officers.
These national, provincial, and local administrative buildings will be built of marble or the finest materials available in the country, so that the grand dignity of the government buildings will be a joy for all times for the whole population, and will express the dignity and sovereignty of the nation.
• Enhancing the dignity of all educational buildings–universities, colleges, and schools–which will be purposefully enjoyed by every generation, and which will be built in the midst of beautiful gardens, fountains, lakes, and playgrounds.
• In every city there will be beautiful festival halls, exhibition halls, exhibition grounds, museums, sport stadiums, and all buildings and monuments that purposefully display the dignity of national life and glorify the culture of the country. These buildings will celebrate the memory of the great leaders of the nation. The whole country will be a country of gardens that display the affluence and dignity of national life.
• In addition to the glorification of administrative and educational buildings in the country, it will be possible to increase the salary of government officers. All such programs come within the range of our program to eliminate poverty.
Healthy Food, Healthy Nation, Freedom, and Independence
Some countries have learned to live on charity; and this is acceptable to their governments, but their people continue to be poor. Those governments have learned not to make an effort to be independent.
Living from charity is not so graceful for human dignity. Charity will never be enough for people to rise above poverty. Bare sustenance is damaging to evolution.
The World Bank (in its report ‘Can Africa claim the 21st century?’) has stated that people in south-Saharan Africa live less well today than they did in the 1960’s and that large influxes of aid in recent decades have done little to improve conditions.
Our program to eliminate poverty will help governments rise above foreign dependence and gracefully stand on their own feet. This is the time when the spirit of freedom is rising in the world, when every country wants to enjoy freedom from foreign dependence. Developing countries must now rise and change their economy so they maintain their sovereignty and freedom from encroachment of foreign influences. Receiving aid from wealthy countries contrasts with the rising spirit of freedom.
The receiver of aid must naturally feel obliged to the donor. In this natural obligation of the receiving country some advantage goes to the donor country, either in the political, religious or economic field. Receiving aid is no fault; only that it stifles the country’s initiative to work and renders its creativity lethargic.
This is no fault on the part of donors, but the governments receiving the donations now have a chance to eliminate poverty and participate in the promotion of organic agriculture on their lands. We invite them to allocate the lands for organic agriculture and give them to us to manage. Within 2, 3, or 4 years they will find that they have risen above the poverty level.
Those giving aid will feel fulfilled that so many years of aid have brought self-sufficiency and self reliance to the country through our program to eliminate poverty.
Fulfilling the Need of the Wealthy through the Poverty Removal Program
The program to eliminate poverty also brings fulfillment to the need of the wealthy. The need of the wealthy is for better health, a more creative mind, and compassionate behavior. The Poverty Removal Program will provide them with healthy food, which combined with proper metabolism, will give them greater creativity and make their behavior more evolutionary according to Natural Law. This will spontaneously unfold the Cosmic Potential of their individual life.
This organic agriculture project will provide the wealthy with nectar, because at present they are eating poisonous food. Therefore, this project is as necessary for the wealthy as it is for the poor.By participating in this program, the wealthy, who are really the creative people in the world, will finance their own well-being; they will have ideal healthy food to support their continued well-being and progress.
This project will prove to be a grand charity for the poor and a grand business for the wealthy.
The poor will lose their poverty; the wealthy will gain wealth and health.When any nation implements the poverty removal program, the government will be delighted to see the prosperity of the nation dramatically rising, government deficits falling, and international debts being retired. The nation will blossom in full sovereignty and self-sufficiency.
With the population satisfied and fulfilled economically a lasting basis for national peace will be achieved. With increased coherence in national consciousness, the population will not make mistakes and create problems.
The government will find problems simply not arising in national life. This will mean the government has achieved a new level of efficiency in administration, and fulfilled the ideal for every government—a prevention-oriented and problem-free administration.