Rebooting the Russian heartland through Global Villages
A recent letter by Franz Nahrada to the governor of Archangelsk, sparked a flurry of republications in various Russian newspapers, showing great interest in the potential of globally interconnected villages.
Here are some details.
Franz Nahrada:
“Just four or five months ago, I had a Skype Conversation with Russian journalist and village rejuvenation activist in Archangelsk, Gleb Tyurin. We know each other from before and he has informed me about his recent work. This work was substantial and successful, but it seemed to lack sustainable support and necessary recognition in Russia. This led to me writing a letter to the governor of Archangelsk, pointing out that there is a worldwide network of people that appreciate the growing potential of village development based on daily global communication and cooperation. I added that people outside Russia do perceive Glebs work, based on activating local human networks for local development purpose, as having shown remarkable and astounding results and that this should and could be the base of a potential “model region” in Russia, where with Russian political support and modest goverment funding and with a network of tapping into resources of creativity and ingenuity around the world we could show how new technologies and creative mindsets could make villages prosper again even in the hardest circumstances. This would also be to the benefit of the Russian nation at large which is, like all the other countries in the world, facing the collapse of the monetary-industrial complex leading to crisis and instability.
The letter was well received by Russian authorities, and led to a series of interviews that were published in a prominent Russian internet portal. They were reprinted dozens of times even beyond Russia, from Kirgizistan to Ukraine. I wrote a second letter to the governor, explaining in more details what our proposal was about and which steps to take.
Last Friday I was invited to talk by Skype-Videobridge in a conference in Mitchurinsk, the agricultural heartland city south of Moscow in the region of Tambow. To my surprise, on the other end there were not only 300 experts listening, but also the Vice Minister of agriculture of Russia, the Vice Chairman of the Council of Federation (the upper chamber of Russian parliament, like American Senate) and many famous politicians. I was requested to again point out why we adressed a proposal to Russia, and I replied that Russia as the biggest country in the world has an incredible potential to make use of its landmass, landscape and resources in a way that creates more living space and sustainable opportunities for people. Russia has shown ability in history to leap forward and create impressive power by turning backwardness into serious and unmatched achievements in science, technology and education by the political will to do so and the perception of potentials in this building from the scratch. There is no reason why this dialectical process should not happen once more, given the increasing pressure of todays economic and ecological crisis.
The answer was that this should be tried out, that there should be more than one test bed in the Russian Federation, and that I was welcome to visit the Russian Federation on behalf of that. All in all, this is showing an incredibly receptive public climate in Russia and a window of opportunity that might close again soon if nothing is delivered.”
April 16th, 2009 at 11:13 am
More details about the history and prospects of such a project in the long interview with Franz Nahrada for the russian ngo-based newsservice Regnum, via www.worknets.org/wiki.cgi?GlobalVillages/FranzNahrada/Workspace/RegnumInterview2. Participating is Gleb Tyurin, Director of the Institute for Social and Humanistic Initiatives in Archangelsk