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Updated, 15:55
SO – WE ALL JUST got a little bit richer. (No, really: only a little bit.)
The European Union’s surprise victory of the 2012 Nobel Prize for Peace – announced in Oslo this morning – also means a cash prize that might make a small contribution in solving the continental debt crisis.
It really only will be a small contribution though: this year, due to the general tightening of belts around the continent, the prize money for Nobel winners has been cut. Previously there was a bounty 0f 10 million Swedish kronor for every prize: this year that’s been cut to 8 million.
That, according to today’s exchange rate, is €923,368. If you want to say that in another way, that’s €0.00178 for every man, woman and child living in the 27-member European Union.
Yep: that’s 0.178 cent per person.
The smallest euro coin is a 1c piece – so even if Messrs Barroso, Van Rompuy and Schulz agreed to send the money directly to member states for distribution among the population, you wouldn’t be able to hold your winnings.
Right now, interest rates are relatively low. AIB will give you 3 per cent interest on deposits. If that rate stayed the same forever, it would take 59 years before your winnings would reach the magical one cent amount.
Of course, with inflation as it is, the chances are that the 1c coin won’t be in circulation in 2071 – in fact, with Finland and the Netherlands already effectively scrapping the 1c and 2c coin, even the 5c piece might be gone by then.
So if we were to assume that the 10 cent coin is likely to survive a currency cull, we would need our winnings to reach 10 cent before we could actually hold it. At current interest rates, it would take 137 years to increase in value by that much.
Even then, there’s no way of being sure that we’ll still have a 10 coin (or even a euro currency, eh?) by the year 2149.
So – if you really want to hold your Nobel prize? Ask for it to be distributed in Iranian rial*, the value of which is diminishing rapidly this month. If you’re okay with seeing your winnings devalue literally before your eyes, withdraw them in Tehran.
Today, €1 is worth 15,835 rial – meaning your winnings worth 28.18 rial. The smallest coin in Iranian currency is a 50 rial piece, so it’s still not enough, but if you put it in a bank in Iran you can get a short-term interest rate of 12.5 per cent.
At that rate, your fortune will have grown to 50 rial in five years’ time – enough for you to actually hold.
Don’t spend it all in one place…
* We should point out that under Irish law it is illegal to transfer funds between accounts in Ireland and Iran.
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so nice to see this becoming important for people. The food industry is rampant with additives, conservatives, all sorts of short-cuts to make production bigger and cheaper. I mean, why the hell is there milk in ham? Can they not just boil a lump of pork, slice it and package it?
Packaging is another issue that seems to me to be out of control…sooo much plastic. But that’s for another day.
Well said Lorcán! I care deeply whats in my food and where it comes from. Be great to see every town with its own thriving food market encouraging farmers and landowners in the surrounding lands to produce real healthy food. So many pluses.. better food for all, more local employment, stronger community, healthier soil and land too. Yes Permaculture is the future and there really is no alternative.. regenerates land, soil, forests, wildlife, cleaner rivers, far healthier food, community empowerment and independence and so much more. Organic growing is just the start.. do your own research into Permaculture and learn how it solves most of our problems.
I too have an issue with packaging. However like it or hate it, plastic packaging is the material that our society has chosen and in the end there’s nothing inherently wrong with plastic, just our management of it. Plastic had many advantages and it dramatically reduces food spoilage, which is good for the environment. Plastic can be made from plants: it doesn’t have to be made from fossil fuels. It can be carbon neutral, biodegradable and sustainable.
Thought this was an interesting read. Makes me want to do something with the little plot outside my house. But for now I’m going to take a walk down the road with my rubber gloves and pick some delicious nettles.
The title made me interested in the article. Sadly the article just turned out to be a really long ad. :-/
Sorry you thought that Logan, and I totally get how beaten down we get by media manipulation. This was an interview I did about our food and how we grow it. We are a very small Artisan Food Producer, we are not a big multinational. We have a 5 acre smallholding where we grow using permaculture techniques, We don’t use any chemicals on our land or in our kitchen.. We sell at farmers markets and now in Supervalu through the Food Academy, an initiative by Bord Bia, the Enterprise Board and Musgraves, aimed to bring small producers like ourselves into the mainstream, giving us the opportunity to grow our business and for us to spread an ethical and environmental ethos. What it has meant for us, is the bigger platform had given us the means to service a debt in moving up a notch, employing someone and taking our business to the next stage. This is not an advert by a large multinational. This is an interview with a genuine small producer. Good Food Ireland Producer of the Year. All Ireland Farmers Market Champions and Guild of Irish Food Writers Award 2015.
No, it’s an advert by a large supermarket chain, piggybacking on your business. You are the product here.
I wish you well, which may surprise you, and I’d try your product too, because I’m lfortunate enough to be able to occasionally buy food because I feel like, rather than for reasons of nutrition or hunger – unlike a great number of people. But I’d do so a second time not because it’s organic, or because of the permaculture, but if it tasted nice.
The other stuff is marketing for an affluent picky market, who want to feel virtuous and superior about what they eat, rather than, you know, full. The same ones who are now filling the coffers of those making exorbitantly expensive (though not so bad in Lidl) gluten free food for people who are not coeliacs and have a ‘food intolerance’ that does not really exist.
Organic/permaculture/chutney is never ever feed large populations and is a distraction at that level. It is of no interest to those feeding people on a tight budget, but serves to make them feel guilty that they are not doing as well as they should.
Organic is irrelevant when it comes to nutrition. If you are doing it for principle and can afford to, fine. But if you can’t afford it don’t feel the least bit guilty or deprived.
Also, this always makes me laugh like a drain
‘.. we really should make quality, high-end food that we can sell to the rest of the world with pride.’
So, we should not import food – cos ‘the environment’, health etc – and we should eat and buy only Irish food preferably locally grown. But meanwhile, we should export away like good things – to hell with the environment – and people in other countries should definitely not eat and buy locally, they should eat our better food.
Hilarious.
This article has cheered me up no end.
‘You could dine out for years on ‘what is the difference between chutney and relish’’
I can honestly say I’ve been on the planet for over 5 decades and never been in the least bothered by this conundrum. If it came up when I was dining out, I’d question my choice of company.
Katie I would agree with you there but from a quick google search (your fault for peeking my curiosity and thus lowering my integrity) from what I can see basically ingredients (same can be in both) and cooking time (which can vary in both) and original origin of the names the product of which now probably has no resemblance to what it was after being messed around with all these years.
Mostly now I think the trems Relish would be used by Americans and Chutney by the English, also Relish would sound more “posh” over the “workingman’s” Chutney and both are basically the same with the ability to make or break a sandwich or burger.
Must bring this up at my next dinner party methinks……. Hmmm maybe not
Love Nettles, many of our native hedgerow foods have incredible medicinal properties . . . and they’re FREE !
Great article. Permaculture and Organic food is the right direction for our little country as we produce enough to feed everyone without Importing (or exporting) our food! There’s more and more courses cropping up all over the country from day courses to full on 2 year degrees. Accessibility is key!
Avoiding Trans Fats (man made) can reverse Diabetes Type 2. US average intake is 2.2 Kgs per annum …. daft!
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/05/fda-trans-fat-ban-118003.html
Surely this is an ad. Is it a paid for advertisement, if so surely that should be written somewhere?
It’s brought to you by SuperValu and there’s a #Sponcered.
Just saw the “Sponsered” on the pic attached to the article on the home page but there is nothing (that I can see) in the article and I must be missing the “Brought to you by Supervalu” because I can’t locate that.
A wonderful example of ‘ad blindness’ Tricia – I love it. Took me a minute too, but there is a little thing at the top beside the titles, and a big red thing at the bottom of the article. When you see them, they are obvious, but like you I at first just automatically filtered them out as ads.
Message to Journal advertisers: Your banner ads are pretty much invisible, even the big red ones. On the other hand, a lot of people don’t notice articles are sponsored. Just bear the comments in mind when creating your copy…
Ha. I only just now noticed the MASSIVE banner ad at the top of the page. So that’s 3 ads, and the one I noticed last is the biggest.
This just gets funnier and funnier.
There was a pattern of red/green thumbs here that was quite normal, all comments were green and red to a natural degree..
Then all of a sudden it changed – like, completely, within about 5 minutes. Any comments not in abject praise of the article are now red-thumbed to death, old and new (banal) favourable comments are green thumbed to the heights.
The PR company are on the ball anyway and earning their crust, have to give them that. Expect this comment won’t even last long.
I imagine the people who click on and read this article would mainly be the people who have an interest in organics/ permaculture and whatnot so they would obviously red thumb comments they don’t agree with. I wouldn’t get too paranoid over the thumbs
Not paranoid at all, amused.
Usually get mine in tesco or lidl
I find Aldi occasionally good too, though I do rate Lidl the best of the three.
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