Update- Oct,2013
I leave the earlier post [below the line] as it is, for archival interest though some – but happily, not all!- dreams have altered, as they usually do when they unfold.
For one 2012 has come and gone and we are nowhere near a position to assess sustainability.
Part-3, dreamt of a education centre of sorts, driven by resident volunteers; but that is unlikely to be. Instead, the concern now is with stability and continuity.
Also, GoodNewsIndia Foundation has been delinked from the project and may be shut down; instead the pointReturn Trust has come into existence.
Read this post for more on this
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Since it begins as the one-man-operation of a 64 year old, this will be a slow dream realised in three parts. I would be grateful if even only Part-1 is realised. But the aim is to realise all three.
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Part-1 of the dream, is to acquire a patch of abandoned land and turn it over to trees and nature. This should take between five and eight years. As the land has already been acquired in 2006, the earliest target year for realising Dream-1, is 2011. During this period, the campus will be planned, trees planted, infrastructure created and resources marshalled for the next two phases.
Part-2 is to make the land generate sustained surpluses of money. It will be from the produce of trees and crops. Processing the seeds of Pongamia Pinnata trees for biodiesel will be the main income activity.
Part-3 of the dream would complete the grand plan. By 2012, an assessment of what the reliable, steady annual income of pointReturn might be, will be made. Based on that number, a learning centre for non-formally skilled children will commence along with a centre for experiments. Two or three core experimenters will be resident on the campus, teaching and working with the children. Several will visit for various periods of time and pursue their ideas.
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Funds budgeted to drive the project till 2014 are in place. Whether the planned funds will suffice, is something only time can tell. That is a factor of time and circumstances. It appears adequate, based on experience.
If Part-1 is realised and the campus begins to generate income, Part-2 will be realised and pointReturn will gain self-sufficiency between 2014 and 2018; the project will fund itself from thereon.
When Part-3 is also realised, pointReturn will be on its own, run by a governing council under the trustees of GoodNewsIndia Foundation. It’s ideal would be to be entirely self-sufficient; or maybe indeed, be a net exporter of fuel, food, funds to the local community and, of ideas, worldwide.