Certainly a revolution occurring in nature conservation at the moment with conserving nature going mainstream and creeping into corporate culture (with carbon credits, green washing boom, net biodiversity planning framework, tree planting companies floating on the stock market, green investment funds booming, the UK's first natural capital company in partnership with L'Oreal being launched etc- see my twitter feed for more on all this) which has all recently been enshrined in law with the Environment Bill which was passed last week.
I've never really been interested in making much money and traditionally identify myself as an anti-capitalist (a Naturalist) and been working in stakeholder groups, community groups and volunteer groups to achieve collective nature conservation and birding objectives while seeing business as a way of funding those initiatives (which are low cost and high impact). However I pretty much lost a lot of faith in all that as a result of my experience at Beddington Farmlands/the Hackbridge Project and being subjected to lack of support and even persecution by trying to work in that framework. Theoretically the model of co-operation appears far superior to market driven models but in reality, the predominate culture dictates what will or won't work.
So whether we like it or not, funding for traditional socio-environmentalism has been cut, local councils and charities are on their knees and as I've said before we are now (since austerity and the 2008 crash) well and truly in a Capitalist/Corporate dictatorship which has hijacked democracy (through extreme lobbying and soft corruption) and who now find themselves holding a somewhat poison chalice in that now they have well and truly slain their 'left wing' competitors are somewhat obliged to take on the work and responsibility of their slaughtered enemies including dealing with the climate and nature crisis. There is so much that can wrong with this!
However despite the decade or so I spent in campaigning and trying to re-build local democracy and community empowerment in holding government and corporations to account, the hope of that just gets dimmer and dimmer. I was politically assassinated by the Sutton council biodiversity officer for God's sake (Inside Croydon articles here that featured various steps of my persecution HERE), betrayed by the bird group and London Wildlife Trust rep, denied funding by Viridor and when I stood for local councillor got about 6% of the vote, despite having devoted nearly a decade of my life for the development of a nature centric community centred around Beddington Farmlands/Hackbridge as the hub of the Wandle Valley Regional Park.
As a result of seeing why socio-environmentalism doesn't work very well (uniting people around rational ideology of co-operation just cannot compete with uniting people around seductive fantasy individualism particularly now- maybe another time, another place it can work but not here and not now ) I find myself converting more to market driven solutions at the precise time when all this is going mainstream.
Of course I won't abandon the community and volunteer initiatives that we are already running but they will be adapted. Also will not forget what we've learnt about campaigning and use of NVDA to challenge our competitors plus remembering the futility (or counterproductivity) of volunteer help and the exploitation of good will in the current corporate dictatorship.
So Little Oak Group are moving with this seismic shift. Our main objective now is to make money to buy land and create nature reserves. This actually makes making money fun (first time its ever really interested me). So basically here is the get rich slowly plan:
1) Investment in the buy to let market in Hackbridge (as we continue to campaign for Hackbridge to become the hub of the Regional Park and increase the value and status of the local area). We already have one property which is now being rented and aim to purchase another one in next few weeks.
2) Investment in Green Investment Funds and Stocks/shares in Green Transition Markets
3) Purchasing of land in project sites such as Bulgaria, Ghana and also UK and explore opportunities in carbon credit trading/ tree planting/ carbon storage financial incentives.
4) Growth in core business activity of green space management
5) The monetisation of projects in Azores and Bulgaria (through eco-tourism)
6) Monetisation of all projects through products and services.
7) A bit of dabbling in cryptocurrency and block chain (currently have small investments in Etherium and USDC)
8) Continue investment/improvements into current HQs in London and Bucks.
The ultimate objective (within the next 5-10 years) would be to create a 6 hectare nature reserve (will need about £2 million which really is not a lot of money in the great scheme and our plan to do that is not over ambitious either) on the coast in a migration hot spot in the UK as the HQ and centre piece to our group portfolio, with a series of smaller nature reserves elsewhere and mini solar system of other projects. We currently have a distributed Net Asset Value of around £3 million (most of which cannot be released) and that is without even trying (barely conscious of how that has happened!) so who knows what will happen if we actually try and make money. This really has fired me up into making money and becoming, after all this time of fighting it, a Capitalist but with one small but fundamental tweak- a Natural Capitalist.
I think the key to keeping things ethical and true to our values is to keep it small, grow it slowly and provide solutions that anyone, anywhere can easily do themselves. Nature Conservation moving into the hands of a de-centralised independent self sustaining empowered community has got to be a good thing. Be nice to be a tiny part of that.
This web site is going to need a makeover: LITTLE OAK GROUP
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