Glossary

Regenerative Economy

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A regenerative economy is a circular economic system that benefits the environment and society as a whole.

What Is a Regenerative Economy?

A regenerative economy is a circular economic system that benefits the environment and society as a whole. Its goal is to create more balanced and sustainable relationships between human beings and the larger planetary ecosystem, in contrast to the exacerbating, negative externalities produced by today’s economic structures. These economies remove the extractive tendencies from today’s centralized models and replace them with more equitable mechanisms to distribute the opportunities to build wealth and invest in the long-term health of our natural ecosystems.  

Regenerative economies utilize regenerative finance (ReFi) which considers how to redesign money as a way to solve some of the most challenging issues we face in the world, with the goal of establishing a new financial system where economics and ecological health are aligned.  

Regenerative economies aim to redefine what currency is to foster the growth of decentralized, circular economies that prioritize local resources and human potential. 

These systems allow people to stop being solely dependent on volatile digital and inflationary assets in today’s fiat economies and also enable access to credit to the financially excluded today.
A regenerative economy has the potential to empower more local and small economies to create their own financial health with the adoption of circular trade and mutual credit networks.  In contrast to centralized models of credit, these economics empower individuals and business owners by enabling access to credit directly from communities without financial intermediaries who are extracting the most value from these relationships today. Assets in a regenerative economy can be non-monetary and instead include goods and services. Communities can then finance access to these resources themselves without the need for banks or existing fiat currency, which enables the financially excluded to access credit that is too costly for them in today’s economic structure. 
The term ‘regen’ describes participants in regenerative finance, which are people who participate in a variety of ways in communities and platforms that use blockchain technology to advance projects that make a positive impact on society.
Author: Ashley Taylor Buck, founder of ReSource

Ashley Taylor Buck is a blockchain entrepreneur who joined the early Ethereum community in 2014 with a vision to further social mobility with this new economic paradigm. She co-founded ReSource to empower local communities and small businesses to grow cooperatively by offering credit to each other. Previously she was the first employee of ConsenSys, a Community Microgrid Specialist for LO3 Energy/Brooklyn Microgrid, pioneered the Cyberthreats and UN Sanctions program for Compliance and Capacity Skills International, and founded a community and events space ReGenCy in Brooklyn.