Ecorates

The participation fee will be 15 Eco per day for people who register before the 1st of August, and 20 Eco for people applying afterwards or comming without registering.

What are Ecorates?

click here for more information about ecorates

Registering is possible with the Application form.

In Ecotopia there is a participation fee that everybody has to pay to contribute to the food and logistics' expenses. To calculate the costs to stay one day in Ecotopia we use, as in other EYFA meetings, the Ecorates System.

The aim of the Ecorates System is to allow people from all countries to make a similar economic effort to participate in Ecotopia according to the average purchasing power of the participant in her own country. Using this system, it costs the same proportion of income for someone from Belarus to participate or to get a drink as it does for someone from Germany.

The Ecorates will be used in the registration table specifically for the participation fee. However, this table will not be functioning in the Eco bar and other places inside the camp, where the Ecorates will be substituted by a 'solidarity' prices system. Therefore, for beers and ice creams there will be three kind of prices:

• a 'low' price (bellow the buying cost, for people who can not afford it otherwise)

• a 'normal' price (which is more or less the buying cost)

• a 'solidarity' price (which is higher than the buying cost and is used by people who can afford to pay more, so that it allows to run the 'low' price as well).

The 'solidarity' prices system, as well as the Ecorates system, relies on people's honesty and solidarity. Everybody should be aware of it and participate so that Ecotopia can take place in this bureaucratic and gold-hungry world still putting into practice other kind of relationships beyond the market.

More about the Ecorates System

why are the Ecorates needed?

It is necessary to create alternative frameworks for our economic relations (paying participation fees, subscription prices...) that break the profit guided and socially careless dynamics. Differences in the prices levels, exchange currency rates, purchasing power... might financially discourage or even impede activists from some countries from participating in international gatherings and seminars or to subscribe to magazines. We should empower ourselves through creating mechanisms to include social concerns in our ways of functioning.

how are they done?

Ecorates system is a fully grassroots and participatory system. The fact that we research to have our own rates rather than using official institutional ones is one of the most important characteristics of the system. We make a survey once a year among activist to collect information about the cost of life in each country through looking at the prices of different basic products, which is subsequently used to calculate the Ecorates and the value of the eco for each country. The Green Pepper magazine publishes the updated Ecorates and they are always available in EYFA website.

how to use it?

Before, we used to use as a reference the German Mark. Now that is has been replaced by the Euro, the ecorate system converts all the Eco amounts to Euros. To know how much that is in your currency, you just have to convert that amount in Euros at the exchange rate you can get. At the table bellow you can find an idea of that but we are aware that the Euro/currency exchanges rates we have might not be fully updated.

how much does it cost to stay one day in Ecotopia?

You have to take into account the Ecorate of the country you are currently living in, your 'nationality' doesn't matter. The participation fee this year will be 15 Eco per day for people who register before 1rst August, and 20 Eco for people applying afterwards or comming without registering. You can check in the table how much is it for every country.

As you can imagine, ecorates system is based in trust, solidarity and altruistic collaboration, so without your help it will not exist. If you can not find your country in the list, you can contact us to fill in the Ecorates questionaire so that we can caculate it before Ecotopia starts.

Use our ecorates for a fairer world!