An improvement of the linkage between the economical and the environmental sphere might contribute to a resolution of our current environmental crisis. Potentially, the introduction of the ECO currency can contribute to such a linkage, yet, further study is needed on the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of the ECO concept.
The ECO–currency project explores the idea of introducing a separate currency for environmental value. Besides US Dollar, Euro, Japanese Yen, Chinese Yuan, British Pound, Brazilian Real, etc. there would also be the ECO, a currency which expresses environmental value. The purpose of the ECO is to counter the lack of representation of environmental values in the economical sphere. The starting point of the project is the hypothesis that an important factor in the ongoing environmental crisis is the disconnect between the economical ecology and the environmental ecology.

The implementation of the proposed linkage between the economical and environmental spheres via the ECO currency will surely be far from trivial. Although we can be sure of one thing: The Amazon rain forest is of enormous value. It only remains to be seen whether we are willing and able to make this value explicit. The implementation of the ECO currency will require a substantial re-cultivation of our financial system, which will certainly not be welcomed by some of the current players. Tough decisions will have to made, both politically, economically as well as in the moral domain.

In order to find answers to the current questions and explore the feasibility of the ECO-currency further, the Next Nature Lab started a research project, which is run by Marcel van Heist, Billy Schonenberg & Jop Japenga and coached by Koert van Mensvoort & Luna Maurer.

Findings are reported on the website www.eco-currency.net.

The original idea for the ECO-Currency emerged during the Paralelo Conference 2009 at the MIS in Sao Paulo, Brazil. The conference brought together artists and designers working with media from three different countries – Brasil, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, to discuss different ways in which collaborations across disciplinary and cultural borders can enable research and new insights into global and local ecological problems. The ECO-Currency project is currently run in the Next Nature Lab by Marcel van Heist, Billy Schonenberg, Jop Japenga, coached by Koert van Mensvoort & Luna Maurer.