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What does MSC stand for you ask?  It stands for the Marine Stewardship Council and it is an organization that is working to ensure that our we and our children have seafood to eat during their lifetime.  According to a 2005 United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization report, fisheries around the world are headed toward extinction.  The facts are:

1. 1/4 of the world’s fish stocks are overexploited, depleted or recovering from depletion. They have been under excess fishing pressure which has reduced their capacity. There is no possibility of increasing fishing activity, and in some cases the stocks may decline further.
2. Roughly 1/2 of the stocks are fully exploited. They are being fished at or close to their maximum sustainable limits. There is no room for further expansion of fishing activity.
3. Around 1/4 of fish stocks are underexploited or moderately exploited and could perhaps produce more.

So, enough with all of the bad news and onto the good news.  The Marine Stewardship Council has been working to fight this trend by employing a rigorous standard to certify seafood products.  There is more information about their certification standards after the jump.

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Remember any of the last 1000 articles you read in the paper? I rest my case.   Read an article that you will never forget, guaranteed.

The Montana Meth Project, est. 2005

Siebel Systems Founder and private philanthropist Tom Siebel has something to teach us about running an anti-drug campaign. Without wasting any time Mr. Siebel launched an anti-Meth media campaign in Montana in the same year that he sold Siebel Systems to Oracle. He decided that he would pay top dollar for the media rather than attempt to achieve impact with the typical non-profit shoe-string budget. He made it a point to pay for the very best and the social return on investment is evidence that higher costs can make a lot of sense.

In the past, several anti-drug campaigns have backfired, having no effect and perhaps even increasing the curiosity of youth and therefore making the problem worse. For example, the federal government’s attempt to curb teenage drug use with a multimillion-dollar ad campaign dramatizing the perils of marijuana has backfired spectacularly. (ref.) Many other examples, including for hard core drugs, can be found elsewhere. Clearly Tom Siebel didn’t want to repeat these results. And although, he openly admits achieving success with Meth have for a number of reasons been easier, nobody else has done what he has done on anywhere near the same scale. The Lifetime meth use by teenagers in Montana has dropped 44.6 percent since 2005. Meth-related crime increased by 21 percent from 2004 to 2005, but dropped by 62 percent in the two-year period that followed through 2007. (April 2008 report – Montana Department of Justice. It is recognized that not all these improvements can be attributed to the Montana Meth Project)

This isn’t where the story stops. The Montana Meth Project has saved Montana taxpayers millions of dollars up an above the costs of the program. Donors and governments of other states have taken note and efforts are taking hold in other states. The details of how he did are even more enlightening and recommend that readers do more research. Like all the other non-profit programs that I highlight each week (I miss some weeks) this is a top performing non-profit. I challenge readers to find other non-profits within the same class which out perform the non-profits I highlight. I want to know about them.

Here are some examples of the disturbing Print Ads and Videos that have worked well in Montana. They’re not uplifting and play on the baser motivation of fear.

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The good folks at “We Can Solve It” are still putting their marketing might behind changing consumer’s attitudes to demand clean energy within 10 years. However, this time, they are focusing on getting government officials involved in the fight. The video above is their new message to U.S. politicians. You might remember this goal of having 100% clean energy in the U.S. in 10 years from Al Gore’s Energy Challenge speech.

It is important that all countries reduce their reliance on a single source of energy, so I’ve listed all of the different sources of energy below. (The video only mentions wind and solar energy.)

1. Wind Energy
2. Solar Energy
3. Geothermal Energy
4. Hydro Energy (Dams, Wave Energy, Tide Energy)
5. Nuclear Energy
6. Fossil Fuels (Oil, Coal, Natural Gas)
7. Space Solar Power System

The technology that is most interesting to me is the Space Solar Power System as it allows electricity to be generated from outside of the Earth’s environment.

Through all of this, it is important to keep everything into perspective. As the U.S. moves to a new energy infrastructure, it needs to consider doing it in a responsible way so that it isn’t a reckless gold rush like it is in upstate New York. What are your thoughts?

PosiPeople, a new community-driven forum that highlights positive impact on society and the environment, has launched today. PosiPeople allows anyone to submit, vote, and comment on any content on the web that is about positive impact on society and the environment. Some examples of the content that PosiPeople gathers is organic food, renewable energy, recycling, hybrid/electric cars, climate change, and green issues. Anyone can register for a free PosiPeople account today.

PosiPeople works as follows:

1. Any member of the community submits a link to content that is about positive social or environmental impact.

2. The community then votes for the content they like best.

3. Content that receives the most votes in a certain period of time is published to the main page of the site.

Additional PosiPeople features allow users to connect with other users by interacting with them through comments, viewing their profile page, sending them a message, or adding them as a friend (a.k.a. a PosiPal).

A few testimonials from PosiPeople’s private beta test are listed below.

“I read the news everyday, and the amount of depressing information I get everyday really brings down my mood. However, PosiPeople shows that our world today is not as gloomy as it seems. It helps me feel good about the world we are living in, while also providing tips on how we can help make it better. I tend to be a negative person, but PosiPeople has helped me be more uplifting, and now I can always see the good in things” says Danwen, an early PosiPeople user.

“PosiPeople is more than just good news, it is a place where I can read and learn about best-in-class solutions to some of society’s most challenging problems. Public charities spent nearly $1 trillion dollars in 2007 solving these challenges,and the mainstream media is almost completely oblivious to the enormous impact that many of these charities are having. Many of these entrepreneurs are so absorbed in their work to improve others’ lives that they don’t have time nor want to promote themselves. People who enjoy and are good at promoting these entrepreneurs now have a venue to do so, and the general public now has a one-stop location where they can get real content and commentary about sincere, smart people making real impact.” says John, another early PosiPeople user.

“I like to read about the people out there who have inspirational stories to tell and who do great things to care for the environment and others. PosiPeople gathers all of these stories and it is the one place I visit often for the upbeat kind of content that I think the internet needs more of” says Evan, another PosiPeople user.

“PosiPeople is a great online resource for anyone who wants to find out more about the things that make a positive impact in our communities” says Pauline, another PosiPeople user.

Some of the additional uses of PosiPeople are listed below.

1. Save a link to an online article that you find interesting and appropriate for PosiPeople.
2. Share content with the PosiPeople community.
3. Find new content that is about positive impact on society or the environment.
4. Vote for content you feel is about or makes a positive impact.
5. Comment about interesting submissions.
6. Connect with other people who share a similar interest.
7. Entertain yourself as you read about amazing people and organizations that impact our lives in positive ways.

Join the community and register for you own free PosiPeople account!

From today onward, for as long as I post to PosiPeople I will dedicate each post to one of the most effective entrepreneurs I am able to find providing direct-services to the poor and needy.

At times I will highlight organizations based simply on a recommendation from an individual who’s opinion I highly respect, other times I will base my reasons for highlighting an entrepreneur on overwhelming evidence. Whether my post is highly subjective or objective - each program will embody natural, timeless principles like: liberty, opportunity, faith, character, hope, personal responsibility and charity.

Charity has largely and falsely come to mean: the mindless giving of money. I hope to help restore it to its original and truer meaning. If you can imagine what an all wise, loving mother feels for her child, you then have a good idea of what charity is. It isn’t something you give, it is something you posses.

In my old line of work as a manufacturing engineer it was almost unforgivable to make the same mistake twice. Nothing destroyed our image of competence faster than repeating a gross error. Continually giving money away without making a conscious effort to place that money where it will have the greatest positive impact is synonymous with making the same mistake over and over again. If an individual is not confident that their money is being given to the most effective organizations within the areas they care about, then they should stop giving until they are.

There is a significant amount of organization-level research that exists, but it is scattered across the world wide web, and I imagine even more so across personal computers and intranets. In order to identify the most effective entrepreneurs providing direct services to the poor and needy I will need to begin identifying and aggregating links to all the third-party organizations providing rigorous organization-level evaluations on organization effectiveness. Both those organizations who make their evaluations public and those that don’t.

Here’s the beginning of a list :
www.cachildwelfareclearinghouse.org
ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc
www.wsipp.wa.gov
www.calvinedwardscompany.com
www.genevaglobal.com
newprofit.org
www.ashoka.org

The more in-depth, professional evaluations we can amass, the more confident we can be that we have truly identified the most effective organizations serving the poor and needy. I hope you will add more links in your comments.

I will highlight the first high performing organization next week.