What's your philanthropic limit?[ 11 vote(s) ]
1.	< R1,000	1 / 9%
2.	< R10,000	7 / 64%
3.	< R100,000	3 / 27%
4.	< R1m	0 / 0%

Most of the coffee we drink in SA is imported, either from Ethiopia, Uganda etc. However, there is now a coffee being grown in the old Transkei and called Transkei Gold. No, it doesn't contain what you might be thinking... It's been grown by an impressively sustainable rural community at the Centre for Applied Rural Technology near Port St. Johns... http://www.cartsa.co.za/ You can also check out their amazing video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBb7votvwbs

So what does this have to do with investing. Well, we're considering creating a wider 'community' of investors for the area. The coffee will prove to be a massive revenue earner down the line and the social investors could benefit from this in time. People could also benefit hugely by visiting the centre as paying volunteers for an education in rural sustainability and an investment in themselves. These skills are probably something we're all going to need if (when) the next financial crises happens and takes down the way of (unnatural) life we've grown accustomed to.

What I'd like to gauge here is how much would you as an example of a 'socially conscious' investor / philanthropist be prepared to invest in a venture such as this, assuming the returns weren't gauranteed but could be potentially quite good in terms of coffee and food revenues etc.

Yes, it's only hypothetical. I'm not soliciting for funds here...

Charity and social investing are often intertwined these days. For instance we have Howard Buffet (Warren's son) as a potential 'investor' but he is really more interested in developing sustainable rural solutions. As most investments (equities, savings, bonds etc) will provide flat or negligible returns over the next couple of years I predict that many more people will seek out a more sustainable and rewarding lifestyle.

Let me throw in a bit about Charity from the 1st degree of Freemasonry:
"...Charity. I need not here dilate on its excellences: no doubt it has often been felt and practiced by you. Suffice it to say, it has the approbation of Heaven and Earth, and like its sister, Mercy, blesses him who gives as well as him who receives. In a society so widely extended as Freemasonry, the branches of which are spread over the four quarters of the globe, it cannot be denied that we have many members of rank and opulence; neither can it be concealed that among the thousands who range under its banners, there are some who, perhaps from circumstances of unavoidable calamity and misfortune, are reduced to the lowest ebb of poverty and distress. On their behalf it is our usual custom to awaken the feelings of every new-made Brother by such a claim on his charity as his circumstances in life may fairly warrant..."

[Updated on: Fri, 02 October 2009 10:54]