Our Tuesday Forum is tomorrow night, and this time it will be a general discussion about the possibility of starting up a Local Exchange Trading System here.
In terms of building a strong, resilient community LETS has a lot of things going for it. Obviously it allows people living on a tight budget to do things they wouldn’t otherwise be able to afford, but it also helps identify the hidden talents of people within the community and builds connections between people.
Come along and join in the discussion about whether we want to set up a scheme here, and if we decide we do, what it would take to make it happen.
L.E.T.S stands for Local Exchange Trading System and there are a number of LETS groups already operating in Australia and overseas. The system offers great possibilities for local communities, with the potential to deliver the advantages of traditional bartering for goods and services without the usual limitations.
The discussion will be led by Evelyn Watchorn, who has been researching this topic for some time and is confident that the scheme could work well in Armidale.
‘Although LETS can work for everybody’ says Evelyn ‘it is of particular benefit for people on lower incomes who have limited cash to spare, even for something as simple as a haircut. It can also give people opportunities to add to their skills base in ways that are not open to them within the regular economy.’
SLA’s Jo Leoni is excited at the possibility that Armidale might once again be engaging with LETS. ‘We had LETS once before in the early 80s’ says Jo ‘ and many people still remember it with great fondness, but I think back then it was pretty time-consuming to administer. The idea has lots of potential benefits for Armidale, so it is well worth looking at it again, now we can use the internet to make the administration more streamlined’.
The forum on L.E.T.S: Opportunities for Armidale will be on Tuesday 2nd November at 7pm at Kent House, Faulkner Street, opposite Central Park. Light refreshments to follow. All welcome, gold coin donation appreciated.
