Seeds of Peace
Economic cooperation is a vital necessity in order to attain and keep a secure and lasting peace.
Stronger economies would mean an increased standard of living among our peoples, resulting in:
- The building of political cooperation, helping to ensure political stability.
- The improving of the social relationships between the two societies.
- The creation of a will for peace, reducing the feeling of despair by creating a feeling of hope for a prosperous future.
- The organized movement of goods and labor between the two markets.
- The general strengthening of the economies within the region.
- Joint efforts to maximize the sharing of the region's natural resources including water, energy, and electricity.
- Independent, yet interconnected and cooperative economies, decreasing the chance of economic sabotage by either government and increasing the feeling of equality both within and between each peoples.
- Equal opportunity for a better life.
- Open trade borders for the free movement of goods to increase trade, including:
- the right to export without limitation and to import consistent with security agreements
- free movement of legal workers except in special cases of economic or security concerns, as these have been agreed upon in this document
- not stopping the flow of natural, electric or communication resources as a political tool
- not interrupting trade between the two markets except in the case of security, as it is agreed in this document.
- International investment, including:
- joint efforts to attract international investment
- striving for balanced trade through investment and cooperation
- working together to establish a common and interconnected infrastructure of roads, water pipes, sewers, energy, electricity and communication.
- working together to pressure the international community to uphold agreements made to either society.
- Respecting the economic interests of each society, by:
- knowing and recognizing each economy's interests
- affirming our mutual commitment to economic growth through local development and empowerment
- allowing developing economic policies which pursue independent interests without hurting the other economy
- not using economic advantages as a political weapon
- accepting that each society has the right to manage and develop the resources on their land provided they do no further harm to the other society
- upholding the right of each country to seek its own resources independently, but striving to seek new resources together from other countries through new development
- Economic and environmental cooperation, including:
- establishing a joint Economic and Environmental Cooperation Committee, the EECC. The EECC will be half Palestinian and half Israeli, with a co-chair from each party.
Its mandate will include:
- making joint economic and environmental studies
- finding out where people will benefit the most from new business and strive to bring it there
- developing and enforcing environmental regulations
- being informed of all industrial and agricultural development close to the border
- coordinating the joint exploitation of water, electricity, and energy resources
- encouraging joint investment in science, industry, tourism and medicine in each economy
- working together to establish a common and interconnected infrastructure of roads, water pipes, sewers, energy, electricity and communication
- ensuring the safe passage of all resources
- ensuring the division of resources consistent with EECC decisions
- sharing information needed for cooperative projects ideas and plans
- cooperation in solving ecological problems
- experts working together to test and find solutions
- scientific research together
- raising environmental awareness together through booklets, the mass media and education
- scientific and industrial cooperation through:
- the exchange of qualified people
- joint research institutes
- joint scientific and industrial education
- cooperation in developing communication, media and tourism, including:
- joint investment in tourist sites and the tourist industry
- the creation of joint tourism agencies
- the joint development of tourism and religious sites
- freedom of access to the religious and tourist sites
- Cooperation in humanitarian and social concerns, including:
- affirming our mutual commitment to the social welfare of everyone in the region
- affirming our mutual commitment to economic growth through local development and empowerment
- medical aid in cases of humanitarian need both for individuals and in general crises
- medical aid not being refused as a political tool
- medical cooperation through
- joint medical research (including AIDS and Cancer research)
- joint medical education and training One suggestion would be that the money contributed per country would be in accordance with the size of the country's Gross National Product (GNP).