Farmers Market Coin - Smart Contracts for the Farmers Market
Today I was meditating on an idea that has been in my head for years. In college I wrote a business plan that was a 20 page paper assignment for my productions class as part of my BBA requirements. The paper was recognized as best paper out of a class of 300 students.
The plan was basically for a company that would setup a grocery store in Austin, TX that was really more of a farmers market because it would focus on contracts with local farmers and producers. The company would also have a local farm and green house so it would be involved in every part of the business all the way from production to distribution to the sale of the local goods.
I have been thinking about the business plan for years and as I see the current local food/farmers market movement towards more decentralized local food production/consumption, as in the past, I am beginning to incorporate cryptocurrency into my business plan and thinking about how that would work.
Farmers Market Coin FMC - a hypothetical coin for future local food markets
As I was envisioning it, alive and well in the future, I saw how it could work with cryptocurrency. Automating the contracts that the local market has with local farmers and using FMC for all transactions. This would mean farmers/producers would be paid for their products with FMC and could use it to buy products from the central market or trade for BTC, USD, etc.
To shop at the market, you would have to have FMC. If you didn't have it already, you would quickly exchange your USD or BTC for FMC. As much as this might seem like a hassle, it could actually automate things to work in a very efficient way, especially for the local producers that were selling to and buying from the central market.
The system could be implemented in any farmers markets or any local markets going on anywhere in the world. There would be a strong use case if government currencies were failing as this would be one of the very first markets that must exist to have any kind of stability in the face of something like a local currency collapse.
Any market could do this if supply and demand actors saw the benefits. Requiring the specific cryptocurrency to be used would immediately give the coin value and local people a way to interact. Access to the internet and processing software and hardware (wallets) would be the main requirements.
Ok, say I am a small time farmer and I have 5 different contracts for said vegetables and eggs. Assuming that I am paid up front by the "company" a total of 10,000 FMC's. As harvest season approaches and demand increases, the FMC "may" increase as people exchange more USD for FMC (if slightly limited amount of FMC), meaning if I am growing the right thing, and people want it, I stand to make more than initially hoped. Very similar to the current plan...buy the seeds, the chemicals, the taxes, and hope the soybean market is good at harvest time to get repaid. Only difference is quality and demand may push the FMC value a little..basically your product and desirability control the value, not some co-op or the Government's import/export policy. I like the sound of this @richardcrill
Interesting Idea, I used to sell at Farmers markets here in the Houston area, I think the demographic of market buyers is probably the same one that would accept and use a crypto currency. The difficulty would be the "old timer" Growers and sellers, that is who you would need to sell on the idea imho!
I agree with you here! The older group that are "stuck in their ways" may object at first, but overall I think this is an interesting idea!
I would love to see this happen
hope you use bancor, otherwise i will hog up FMC at harvest while they cheaper than dirt.
Yeah, maybe a consulting firm that would onboard farmers to the crypto world would help. Give them the ability to accept all coins, the same pro decentralization people would adopt.
Just gotta make it easy for the Farmers, have them focus on just the farming.
Good stuff @richardcrill.
Great post
Good initiative @richardcrill. Your initiative should be welcomed all over the world because things are changing.
how it's different from current US banknotes?
they already use US banknotes for be paid and buying all necessary things. Why they would need something else?
Just to do it without banks especially in the case where the local currency is crashing or experiencing hyper inflation.
You wrote you live on Taxes.
What kind of hyper inflation and crash you can see now with US dollar?
Re-steemed - good stuff!
Wow, it would take some serious marketing and networking to get a foothold, and some tech savvy farmers for sure, but I think the concept is awesome. I had thought about how could it would be to start an aquaponics farm. If they continue to become more popular I think that would be a great target demographic.