NationStates Jolt Archive

Please join the Community of Eiga-Baka in efforts to promote the socially and politically beneficial practice of demonetization. We have an edible currency (the shiitake mushroom) and would like to forge trade alliances with other nations with edible currencies.

Here is a news item about a smaller, locally-based effort (http://www.portlandtribune.com/sustainable/story.php?story_id=117346673927891500) that perfectly embodies our ideal.

Please join the Community of Eiga-Baka in efforts to promote the socially and politically beneficial practice of demonetization. We have an edible currency (the shiitake mushroom) and would like to forge trade alliances with other nations with edible currencies.

As far as monetization goes ICCD does barter.. but does have it's fixed unit both credit, and atom standards such as the gold standard cuneus.. although other commodities are graded on a trade table.

Likewise credit basis can be converted for shares of quotas which can directly relate to surplus foods..

since ICCD feeds all citizens via food quotas via the social welfare system..as long as they are public employees or take part in the public service employment program or buy the annual food service using credits earned from private endevour.. .. etc..

so while we do not have an edible currency.. our currency directly allows people to eat.. and since the official currency is not the onyl standard of trade allowed, nor the only means of aquiring goods and services...

technically with people largely earning and being the currency and humans being edible..then technically the true currency would be humans.. and very much edible.. as is the practice with the deceased where transplant or other higher order use needed..

so if you take that then technically we may be able to trade humans for mushrooms.. it makes sense to us...

what exactly are your mushrooms..

ps. we've been growing mushrooms and roots and other materials for thousands of years as a largely underground cave dwelling culture...

so we are very interested in your species of mushroom..

exaclty how many do you need to buy a car?

It probably be about 50 non public employees for a car... using that as a base line we may be able to figure out a trade balance...

As far as monetization goes ICCD does barter.. but does have it's fixed unit both credit, and atom standards such as the gold standard cuneus.. although other commodities are graded on a trade table.

We, the Eiga-Bakamono, as we call ourselves, have thought long and hard about the problems we have faced in monetized economies. We are a voluntary community of people who have had it with cash, and have organized ourselves in this great experiment of not allowing cash to be exchanged within our borders. Naturally, people who come to our country from the outside may have cash to spend but very little in the way of shiitake mushrooms, and certainly not fresh ones. Some even make pathetic attempts to smuggle in reconstituted dry mushrooms, such as one can purchase in any East Asian food market. However, seeing as we are a major producing country of premium fresh shiitake, our customs agents are not fooled. However, our policy towards such smuggling is somewhat more lenient than confiscation of such holdings, imprisonment of smugglers or death by firing squid. (yes, squid. The ink is lethal in sufficient doses) We accept dried and reconstituted shiitake as discounted against the value of fresh shiitake.

Likewise credit basis can be converted for shares of quotas which can directly relate to surplus foods..

since ICCD feeds all citizens via food quotas via the social welfare system..as long as they are public employees or take part in the public service employment program or buy the annual food service using credits earned from private endevour.. .. etc..

This is where I believe we can do business. We are also a major producer of trout. Domestically we take shiitake in payment for trout and usually use the shiitake in the kitchen when we cook the trout we just sold, to prepare the national dish, i.e. trout and shiitake. We would be very happy to accept other foodstuffs from foreign visitors in exchange for shiitake, trout and our other chief trade items: refinished furniture and insurance policies. Visitors to our country who contemplate bringing money, should make arrangements elsewhere to purchase food to use in trade before attempting to enter the country. We are not able to exchange your leftover shiitake for cash when you leave the country, but may we interest you in this stunning Louis XIV writing table, fully insured for its replacement cost in shiitake?

If not, there is no cause for alarm, because you may take fresh shiitake out of the country as long as it has been paid for (in our experiment, with dried or reconstituted shiitake and/or other foodstuffs). If you must have cash in hand, I'm told that there are many fine dining establishments operating in monetized economies that will pay top dinar for fresh shiitake. To prevent fraudulent conveyance of stolen shiitake, all of the mushrooms we grow are laser inscribed and chipped with a distinct barcode. Stolen mushrooms will not have been pre-registered for export and will set off an alarm when scanned at the border. Not to worry, the chip is completely and safely digestible.

so while we do not have an edible currency.. our currency directly allows people to eat.. and since the official currency is not the onyl standard of trade allowed, nor the only means of aquiring goods and services...

This is encouraging, indeed. You appear to be well on the way to demonetization, perhaps without knowing or desiring it. But it is our position that everybody eats better when we have to feed each other.

technically with people largely earning and being the currency and humans being edible..then technically the true currency would be humans.. and very much edible.. as is the practice with the deceased where transplant or other higher order use needed..

so if you take that then technically we may be able to trade humans for mushrooms.. it makes sense to us...


That is a novel suggestion, and one we would take under advisement, but our current protein situation is such that we have more than enough trout and don't think we need to tap into the human flesh market.

what exactly are your mushrooms..

ps. we've been growing mushrooms and roots and other materials for thousands of years as a largely underground cave dwelling culture...

so we are very interested in your species of mushroom..



Shiitake (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiitake) are just about the most sublime thing you can serve with trout, or a host of other foods, except maybe lemon meringue pie. The taste of shiitake is the culinary equivalent of the blues. It's like B.B. King doing the same amazing things to your tastebuds as he does to your ears.

exaclty how many do you need to buy a car?

We've heard of cars, of course. We've seen them in movies (our national pastime), but we don't use them in Eiga-Baka (except possibly as props in our nascent film industry).

It probably be about 50 non public employees for a car... using that as a base line we may be able to figure out a trade balance...

Everybody in Eiga-Baka is self-employed, i.e. those who have positions that would traditionally be called staff or employees are actually independent contractors. All persons are encouraged to think of themselves as entrepreneurs, whether they own a trout farm or are beggars on the street. Even thieves are recognized as entrepreneurs whose criminal activities can be curbed with suitable retraining and incentives to make a living in more socially acceptable ways.

You should know if you come to visit our country, that we don't have a tourist industry in the traditional sense. We don't have hotels, but we have many fine restaurants. Our land mass is quite small, so it's easy enough to arrange guest lodging in our Hampshire neighbor of The Free Micronation of Catland Executive.

I am grateful to have had this correspondence with you, not just as an opportunity to explain our position to the world but also as a way of getting to know what the world wants and what we can do to be of service while remaining true to our principles. If you find that our economic policies make sense, we hope that you will consider endorsing us in the U.N. so that we can propose a resolution in support of an edible currencies fair trade alliance.

A review of the monetary policy of Penguinopoli has shown that the opus (O$) has outlived it's usefulness. Effective earlier today, following your lead, we have implemented the herring (H$) as the new national currency. In an attempt to counteract runaway inflation, the central bank is exchanging O$ for H$ at a rate of 10,000:1. It will no longer be necessary to take a barrow-load of opuses to the store to buy a case of herring. Instead citizens will be able to take a herring to the store to buy a wheelbarrow.

Whatever help you can give during this transition will be remembered.

At first blush, this may not seem to be directly to the demonetization movement, but on deeper reflection, I believe that, even in a market-driven edible currency economy, healthy food will win out over heart-attack-on-a-plate: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7250608.stm