A response to economic meltdown

This is a message that a group of us from Lower Hutt Transition Towns have sent out inviting people to respond to the specific situation relating to global economic meltdown - something that still seems to be outside the reality of many in the movement here in New Zealand.

A message to Lower Hutt Transition Towns and other interested parties

At the time of writing this the situation in Europe looks as if it could come to a head quote soon.

There have been warnings of this, including from Muenchau who warned that the Euro could collapse within the next 10 days.

http://www.businessinsider.com/wolfganc-munchau-the-eurozone-has-10-days-at-most-2011-11

This will have immediate consequences in Europe: it would lead to the failure of banks and social unrest and panic, especially in countries like Greece, Italy, Spain and Portugal, although as we know countries like Ireland, Belgium and France are in trouble.

The elected leaders of Greece and Italy have resigned and been replaced by “technocrat” leaders who, without exception are linked with international banking cartels.

All the “solutions” to the crisis involve the loss of sovereignty of affected countries.

The British Home Office has been reported by the Telegraph as putting together plans to evacuate British citizens from affected countries.

http://www.robinwestenra.blogspot.com/2011/11/prepare-for-riots-in-euro-collapse.html

There is NO DOUBT that such a break-up of the Eurozone would have immediate and devastating effects on the world economy - and that is why we have seen emergency meetings of US president Obama and his officials with officials of the EU (NOT the political leaders).

The elections in New Zealand have made it perfectly clear that no help is going to come from the government and that it is up to the citizenry to make some preparations.

One of the most relevant comments recently came from Winston Peters who said that New Zealand is in crisis and the citizenry are not being prepared.

It is known that the Reserve Bank in New Zealand has (or is) enacting policies to be introduced in the case of failure of one or more banks that involves “haircuts” for investors, including depositors - so I would not assume that your money is safe in the bank.

http://robinwestenra.blogspot.com/2011/11/important-warning.html

When the crisis in the Eurozone does come to a head it is likely that this will lead to a rapid succession of events that will affect not just Europe but the United States and eventually the whole world economy.

There are already signs that economies EVERYWHERE (Including China and Japan) are in crisis - our guess is some time during the northern winter, perhaps during our Christmas holidays.

It is also possible that these events may be kept at bay by the further injection of debt-based electronic money by the United States.  Everyone knows that this situation is unsustainable and is really only buying time.

We do not see this as either doom-and-gloom or a reason to panic.

Rather, it is important that our Transition Town community keep in contact with each other; that we keep in contact with our families, friends and neighbours and be prepared to help each other in what would be difficult times.

We consider it would be prudent to (if you haven’t done so already) make some basic prepartions, which might include the following:

1. Ensure that you have a supply of food in the house as you would in the case of an earthquake.  The amount involved, frequently mentioned is about three weeks supply.

2. Make sure that you have a readily-available supply of cash so that you are not dependant on cash machines and EFTPOS in the case of crisis.  One suggestion was to have the amount of money you would use over a 5 day period - and double that.

3. Have a quantity of fuel available

4. Have some water stored (as you might for an earthquake) and an alternative form of cooking.

Geoff Burn

Juanita McKenzie

Natalie Hormann

Pam Crisp

Robin Westenra