Agency 4: Health and Nutrition
The Health and Nutrition Agency is the fourth agency in the community. The agency is part of the District Bureau, which also comprises Agency 5 (Life Planning) and Agency 6 (Sports, Arts, and Recreation). The agency is tasked with facilitating participants’ access to quality healthcare, and food, and supporting limited partners who work in the healthcare and food production sectors.
The agency additionally controls all cropland and pastures except the controlled environment agriculture (CEA) and Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) which are located in the mirrored industrial blocks.
The agency also provides health and life insurance services to participants. The agency is tasked with building and managing the 24 multifunctional district buildings.
The District Bureau’s core responsibility is to provide services that enhance and maintain participants’ quality of life and provide avenues for social development.
The Health and Nutrition Agency receives funds in the form of investment from the Capital Bank Agency (agency 8), which it then uses for its operations, including providing chargeable services to participants. The agency also uses these funds to pay and down payments for any loans it may need to procure assets. From the revenues the agency generates, it is able to honor its obligations, such as loan repayments, as well as paying a return to the Capital Bank for capital invested. The agency is therefore geared to run on a profit, while delivering quality and affordable services.
Overview: food production in the community
Part of the community’s aim to provide sustainable prosperity to participants is achieved by facilitating the production of healthy food that optimizes land use and productivity and minimizes agriculture’s impact on the environment.
The community’s setup gives every participant an opportunity to produce food. There is a garden behind every apartment, to which the limited partner renting it has a first right to farm there. If the limited partner is unable or unwilling, the garden is rented out to a professional farmer.
Having more people engage in food production means that there are diverse farming practices and a variety of food produced. This promotes sustainable agriculture, more responsible farming that is organic and environmental-friendly, and greater responsiveness to market needs. This can help in producing healthier and more nutritious food.
To be competitive as businesses, farmers in the community prioritize growing a larger variety of foods, which helps in maintaining biodiversity and more choices for consumers.
Growing food, especially perishable produce such as vegetables close to where people live also helps minimize food miles – the distance that food travels from farm to fork. The greater the distance, the greater the chances that the food will have more preservatives and processing, less fresh and nutritious, and have a bigger carbon footprint.
The community prioritizes rearing animals in environments that are as close as possible to their natural habitat but still producing optimal animal products – meat, dairy, and eggs. Additionally, the community aims to thoroughly integrate animal rearing and crop farming to be mutually beneficial to each other, and human health.
The employment of concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) is frowned upon because of the various challenges it poses to animal and human health. Among them, meat produced through CAFO depends on antibiotics and hormones to boost growth and prevent disease. This has been cited as a reason for rising cases of antibiotic resistance in people who consume meat.
CAFO meat has less nutritional value, attested by the different levels of fatty acids in the meat compared to pasture-reared meat. CAFO operations are usually enormous undertakings that exert too much pressure on the water resources in the areas they are situated. The operations are also often unable to control the air pollution associated with the crowded nature of their pens. For these reasons, among others, the community favors pasture-fed livestock rearing, to the extent that it is economically viable.
Vertical farming, which involves indoor food production, especially of vegetables, and aquaponics, which integrates both meat production (fish rearing) and crops, are also promoted alongside traditional, outdoor farming. This enables the community to, within a small area, produce diverse foods for the people, promoting a healthy diet and providing business opportunities for more participants.
With these considerations, the Health and Nutrition Agency works with participants to have as many people as possible engage in gainful food production while aligning such production with environmental, health, and ethical considerations. Currently, the standard Western diet uses up around 1-3 acres per person per year. However, it has been blamed for some health conditions, due to low representation of fruit and fiber, and a high concentration of ultra-processed foods. The agency endeavors to manage this.
Roles of the Health Nutrition Agency
The duties of the Health and Nutrition Agency are centered on providing participants with quality food and healthcare, as well as insurance services. However, the agency is also responsible for developing and managing the 24 district buildings. These buildings serve as offices for community public servants. They also serve as hotels, recreational facilities, schools, and hospital rooms, among other uses that they are specially designed to be applied for.
With the agency presidency providing the necessary strategic direction, which is implemented by the district (operational) presidencies, the agency performs a number of duties as detailed below, with the help of its automated system and contractors. The duties include:
- Facilitate and promote physical and mental health
- Master lease of hospital space from agency 6
- Facilitate the production and consumption of the right quality and quantity of food
- Provide health and life insurance
- Training
- Facilitate food production in the community
Mental and physical health
The Health and Nutrition Agency works with relevant players, including medical professionals, participants, and other agencies to enable the community to achieve and maintain health: a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being. The agency aims to work with businesses and participants to positively influence the drivers of health: diet, social circumstances, access and quality of health, and regulatory framework
The community focuses on public health as the best way of providing health services. Public health is centered on preventing disease and medical conditions, prolonging life, and promoting health. The Health and Nutrition Agency achieves its objectives through some measures, including:
- Health analytics – Advanced analytics are embedded in every aspect of a participant’s life. The agency’s health information management system analyses blood pressure, and blood sugar, in real time. The system also has tools for urinalysis, stool analytics, and weight measurement. For instance, when a participant sits on a toilet bowl, a smart system can determine their age, blood pressure, and heart rate, and conduct a thorough analysis of body fluids and other waste. This greatly helps in catching illnesses before they even develop and alerting the relevant parties. Imaging people in their daily activities, while taking extra steps to protect their identity enables the system to catch a fall before it happens, and look out for strokes and heart attacks, among other important preventive measures.1
- Highly-qualified personnel – The agency works with other agencies, such as Human Relations, to ensure a balanced supply of health practitioners in all fields. Once they join or qualify, the agency provides the right framework through which these professionals can continually learn to improve their expertise. The agency also champions the application of evidence-based practice, such that participants receive treatment using the latest knowledge in an area. For instance, new evidence suggests that after bowel cancer surgery, many patients need not undergo chemotherapy. A study has found that the surgery is effective in removing the cancer from the body. Such new knowledge would help participants who have already been operated on.
- Advanced and accessible health services – Every hub in the community has an emergency room (ER), to which patients go for regular checkups as the system may advise, or to seek medical attention. The ER is run by medical professionals, who lease state-of-the-art equipment from the Business Operations Agency (agency 3). The proximity to quality health services significantly improves participants’ health outcomes. In most cases, patients recover at home, with the help of the necessary medical equipment and assistance as needed. In some cases, they may require intensive care. Intensive care units are also accessible in the district buildings, ad also boast highly qualified personnel and high-quality equipment and medical supplies.
Technology, advanced facilities and equipment, and medical personnel all collaborate to achieve the best health outcomes for patients under the facilitation of the Health and Nutrition Agency. The agency provides the systems through which medical personnel collaborate. It also provides a means through which the health information management system collaborates with health professionals to provide participants with medical attention as needed. The agency also works with other community agencies to provide avenues for lifetime learning to ensure medical practitioners stay on top of their game while gaining invaluable experience.
Master lease of medical space
Commercial space in the community is owned and operated by the Commercial Agency (agency 2), while the Sports, Arts, and Recreation Agency (agency 6) owns district buildings. These spaces are where clinics, ERs, and hospitals operate from, since the community aims to have medical facilities close enough to those who need them.
To streamline healthcare provision, the Health and Nutrition Agency identifies the spaces that are conducive for providing these services. It then proceeds to lease them from the relevant agencies, and re-leases them to healthcare practitioners.
Food and nutrition
The Health and Nutrition Agency understands that food is inextricably tied to health, and by extension, to prosperity. The agency endeavors to ensure that food production is undertaken by as many people as possible, as close to the community as practical, and that people have more information about the food that they consume.
Each participant has a chance to engage in food production. The Participants have the first right to grow vegetables in their front and back yards in their apartment. In the village squares, businesses can lease space to grow more vegetables and fruits. All this means that fruit and vegetables travel a small distance from farm to fork, there is less wastage due to commercial considerations for perfection, and fewer agrochemicals are used.
In the mirrored villages, controlled environment agriculture (vertical and green farms) is practiced. This provides additional vegetables, as well as fish. In the agricultural land and pastures, other farmers rear livestock and engage in large-scale grain production. The agency works with other agencies and farmers to ensure that the community has the right quantity and variety of food needed to sustain itself. In instances where self-sufficiency is impossible, the agency works with food importers to maintain quality and cost implications for participants.
The Health and Nutrition Agency works with farmers to ensure that they engage in best practices in farming. For instance, the application of dangerous chemicals is tightly controlled by the agency through regulations, enforced by automated testing and contractors who work as monitors. Farmers are given extensive education to equip them with the skills necessary to produce healthy food.
Because food is grown by so many people, and travels small distances, it is significantly cheaper than would be the case in a normal economy where food travels large distances. Using controlled agriculture and gardens within the community, participants enjoy a greater variety of foods, which significantly improves their diets.
Food in the community undergoes significantly less processing, again due to the distance covered, and the dissemination of information on the advantages and disadvantages of processing. The agency works with food processors to ensure they apply healthy processing techniques and avoid, as much as possible, any harmful practices and substances. Mislabeling is also monitored so that participants are fully aware of what they are consuming. Participants are also educated on healthy eating, as a principal means of ensuring a healthy life and keeping disease at bay.
The Health and Nutrition Agency appreciates the importance of health information in preventing illness. The agency runs regular online training sessions that educate participants on growing food, the importance of proper diets, how and when to seek medical opinion, and how to look out for fellow participants, especially dependents. The agency also trains participants on its insurance services, to assist them in purchasing decisions.
The agency trains contractors who help the agency discharge some of its duties. For instance, contractors who maintain the multifunction district buildings receive extensive training so that they can help users achieve maximum value from the space they rent.
Life and health insurance
The Health and Nutrition Agency offers life and health insurance services to all participants. Life insurance is an agreement between the agency and a participant, whereby the agency (insurer) commits to pay a designated beneficiary a sum of money upon the insured’s death, or elapsing of a specific period. The agency can also release the funds when the insured suffers a terminal or critical illness that prevents them from carrying on with life as before. The amount depends on the life of the contract and premium payments.
The agency offers catastrophic health insurance, which covers expensive treatments, usually more than $10,000. The agency’s health cover has significant deductibles – it does not cover checkups, routine medical services, and nonessential medical procedures, such as cosmetic surgery. Such medical expenses are settled by the participant out of their savings or checking accounts.
The agency keenly assesses certain characteristics of its clients to determine the payable premiums, and whether to offer health insurance at all. Age, and current health status, are some of the important considerations.
As every participant is insured, the agency has a large pool of money. It invests these resources in the Capital Bank Agency. The bank in return pays the agency an annuity on invested funds. The agency uses the annuity payments to improve its services, and in turn, pay back a return on capital investments. This ultimately means that the ultimate capital investor – the limited partner, enjoys a higher return. The annuities are also used to repay any loans the agency may have taken from the Community Bank Agency. Ultimately, insurance services will be very cheap, due to the low incidence of claims, and this unique investment model.
Facilitate food production
Cropland and pasture acquisition
After acquiring land with assistance from the Capital and Community Bank agencies, the health and Nutrition Agency further develops agricultural blocks and pastures where necessary to make them fit for farming activities. This includes fitting irrigation systems and water management facilities as needed and available, and soil testing to establish which areas may need additional farm inputs to make them fit for crop cultivation, among others.
Due to the geographical or climatic circumstances in an area, a community may need more or less land to feed the same number of people. The agency works out how much land is needed during the acquisition process, and also determines how the land will be utilized when growing food, animal feed, and pasture. 2 The community through the agency acquires extensive amounts of land as may be needed to optimally produce food, regenerate the soil, and accommodate other environmental demands.
Facilitating farming
With the land acquired and the necessary infrastructure in place, the Health and Nutrition Agency leases the land to farmers to produce food. Farmers are current or upcoming limited partners with extensive knowledge of farming. They should be able to provide food in the required quantities, quality, and variety as needed to sustain a healthy lifestyle in the community.
The agency issues farmers with leases that are renewable upon satisfactory performance. Leases depend on the duration within which a farmer’s performance can be assessed fairly. For instance, the lease to a farmer growing wheat will be different from another farmer’s, who intends to produce avocadoes.
Land is competitively allocated based on availability, the farmer’s experience and capability, and their business plan. The agency can in some instances give a farmer a trial run to determine whether they can assure optimal production, before allocating them more land or withdrawing a lease.
Indoor and controlled environment agriculture, using greenhouses, vertical farms, and aquaponic farms are located in the mirrored villages. These farms are owned and leased out by the Health and Nutrition Agency to professional farmers. The farms focus on fresh produce – vegetables, and herbs, for instance. Storage of grains is also done in silos located in these mirrored villages.
Large-scale agriculture, producing grain and other crops that require large-scale production to be economically viable is practiced beyond the mirrored villages. Large farms are located a maximum of 10 miles from the community’s built-up area (residential area). Farmers can easily commute to and from their apartments to the farms and back daily.
Some pastures are located alongside outdoor farms, and may periodically rotate based on the agency’s plans for regenerating soil exhausted by crop farming. Additional pastures are available beyond the 10 miles used for large-scale farming. This land is between 50 – 200 miles away from the community, in the hinterlands. Ranchers and herders who work in these areas set up temporary shelters, which can be easily dismantled as needed. They stay in these camps for two weeks a month and spend the other two weeks in the inner community. This allows them to be active members of the community.
The community’s agricultural industry is highly mechanized, using smart technologies including robotics to improve productivity and reduce overheads. The machinery needed to do this is provided by the Business Operations Agency (agency 3). The agency does not provide farmers with this equipment directly. Instead, it liaises with businesses vetted by the Health and Nutrition Agency, which hire the equipment, and lease it to farmers. This arrangement relieves the two agencies of the logistical headache that is needed to provide farmers with what they need on time, presents additional business opportunities, and creates more income for the agencies.
The Health and Nutrition Agency requires all farmers and ranchers to insure their crops and livestock against crop failure, disease, and other risks. This insurance is provided by the Health and Nutrition Agency (agency 4). Businesses also take out insurance against business disruption that may occur as a result of these issues, which is provided by the Life Planning Agency (agency 5). The Business Operations Agency secures insurance for its assets, including the equipment it leases, with the Recreation, Arts and Sports Agency (agency 6).
Monitor food production
The Health and Nutrition Agency closely works with farmers to ensure that they employ the right farming techniques that ensure that the food produced is produced sustainably, and is fit for human consumption. Towards this, the agency has some agrichemicals that it bans from use, based on scientific evidence of their detrimental effects on human health, the environment, and animals. It regularly tests crops and animals to ensure they are being reared as per regulations.
Besides the quality of production, the agency also monitors quantity. Farmers receive leases competitively. A less-than-ideal production is picked up by the agency, which engages the farmer to see whether there is any help they need to boost production. If the interventions do not help, the agency can cancel the lease and award it to another farmer who shows that they are more capable.
The agency keenly promotes soil regeneration techniques. Overgrazing, persistent monocultural cultivation, and improper irrigation techniques are all discouraged. The agency routinely monitors the farming and ranching practices to ensure that farming is sustainable and that these practices are not practiced.
How the agency works
Background on presidencies
Every presidency in the community is a four-member entity whose members represent one of the four major demographics, known as divisions: partnered males (A), partnered females (B), single males (C), and single females (D). However, a president serves the whole community in their role, rather than only their own demographic. Presidents’ diversity and commitment to serve all is provided for in the community bylaws and ensures that all access services without any discrimination. These four major demographics are evenly split in ordinary society, with each group accounting for between 23 and 27% of the population, and with regular fluctuations as people’s status changes.
The community appreciates that discrimination across all social categories happens based on status – single or partnered, other social categorizations notwithstanding; partnered males are likelier to dominate other demographics, especially single males and single females. The community’s infrastructure promotes equal access to economic and social resources and opportunities.
The composition of the community as a whole and those who serve it in the community public service is closely monitored to prevent numerical domination, which can lead to nepotism or unequal access. Besides a person’s status as single or partnered,, the recruitment to be a participant, and to serve in the public service carefully considers other social categorizations, to ensure racial, ethnic, religious, and sexual groups are well represented in the community as they are in the society in which a community operates.
These considerations inform the constitution of the community public service. The diversity in community public service, which is provided by bylaws, is aimed at creating a community that is blind to all other considerations besides service to participants. The service is therefore designed to be free of discrimination.
Agency presidency, bureau board, and demographic presidencies
The Health and Nutrition Agency is served by an agency presidency, comprised of 4 presidents from the four major demographics, which handles strategy formulation and adjustment, as well as formulating and communicating operational procedures for the agency. Additionally, the presidency also facilitates the setting up of the agency’s automated system and adjusts it as necessary to better achieve its goals.
As part of the District Bureau, the agency presidency forms a bureau board with agency presidencies serving the Life Planning and Recreation & Arts agencies. The board acts as a check and monitoring tool for individual presidents and agencies, especially when decisions have far-reaching implications for the community.
Within the bureau board, three presidents from the same demographic form a demographic presidency. There are four such presidencies in the bureau. The demographic presidency performs an advisory role to presidencies and agencies regarding a particular demographic; it does not have operational or executive authority. that cut across the three agencies. The demographic presidency also plays an important role in the mentorship and training of new presidents.
| Demographic presidency A | Demographic presidency B | Demographic presidency C | Demographic presidency D | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Agency presidency, Health and Nutrition (4) | 4A | 4B | 4C | 4D |
| Agency presidency, Life Planning (5) | 5A | 5B | 5C | 5D |
| Agency presidency, Recreation and Arts (6) | 6A | 6B | 6C | 6D |
District presidencies
Each of the 24 districts is served by three district presidencies. Each presidency in a district serves a specific agency in the District Bureau, such that there is a district presidency for Health and Nutrition, Life Planning, and Recreation and Arts. The district presidencies implement the agency’s policies and strategies, as set by the agency presidency. They also report back to the agency presidency on issues that they deem need to be changed in the agency’s operations.
The three district presidencies that serve a district, each comprised of four presidents, come together to form a district board. The district board helps individual presidents in decision-making that impacts the whole district, mentorship, and orientation of incoming presidents. Three presidents on the board who serve the same division also form a demographic presidency. This is better illustrated in the table below, showing an example of District 1.
| Partnered males (A) | Partnered females (B) | Single males (C) | Single females (D) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| District presidency, Health and Nutrition | 1(4)A | 1(4)B | 1(4)C | 1(4)D |
| District presidency, Life Planning | 1(5)A | 1(5)B | 1(5)C | 1(5)D |
| District Presidency, Recreation, and Arts | 1(6)A | 1(6)B | 1(6)C | 1(6)D |
Where: 1 – district number
(4) – agency served
A – demographic group
Limited partners and branch presidencies
Limited partners and dependents
A limited partner is the basic unit in the community. A limited person, usually above 18 years old, but sometimes as young as 16, has been admitted into the community and has invested $20,000 as partnership interest, for which they earn a return. This is regarded as one unit of partnership interest.
Over time, a limited partner can add more units of partnership interest, as their business prospers. The more partnership interest units a limited partner has, the more the return they receive from the Capital Bank.
A dependent is a minor, or a person living with a disability, under the care of a limited partner. In some instances, a dependent may be a fit adult, who for various reasons is supported by community agencies, and assigned by contract to a limited partner. Limited partners are responsible for any legal agreements that their dependents enter into, either with community agencies or other participants, and therefore have the right of attorney.
Together, limited partners and dependents are referred to as participants. Participants who are dependents, because they are still minors, can start a business when they reach 12 years of age. This allows them to save up and invest $20,000 into the community by their 18th birthday, and possibly as early as 16.
Limited partners and their dependents reside in apartments (village buildings). Each apartment has 4 floors, with each floor containing 16 apartments. Each floor has floor has 7 – 12 limited partners, with each limited partner having 1 – 3 dependents. Each floor therefore has around 25 residents. With four floors, each building has approximately 100 residents. An apartment building also forms a branch.
Limited partners and unit
A limited partner is the basic unit in the community. A limited partner, usually above 18 years old, but sometimes as young as 16, has been admitted into the community and has invested $20,000 as partnership interest, for which they earn a return from the Capital Bank Agency, which invests other community agencies. This is regarded as one unit of partnership interest. Over time, a limited partner can add more units of partnership interest, as their business prospers. The more partnership interest units a limited partner has, the more the return they receive from the agency.
A dependent is a minor, or a person living with a disability, under the care of a limited partner, and who has, in any of these cases, given their power of attorney to the limited partner. In some instances, a dependent may be a fit adult, who for various reasons is supported by community agencies, and assigned by contract to a limited partner. Limited partners are responsible for any legal agreements that their dependents enter into, either with community agencies or other participants. Together, limited partners and dependents are referred to as participants.
Participants who are dependents, because they are still minors, can start a business when they reach 12 years of age. This allows them to save up and invest $20,000 into the community by their 18th birthday, and possibly as early as 16. Limited partners and their dependents reside in apartment buildings (village buildings). Each apartment building has five floors, with four containing apartments. An apartment building also forms a branch.
Captains and branch presidencies
Of the approximately 100 residents in a branch, around 40 of them are limited partners.They are divided into 4 units, each of which has 10 limited partners and their dependents. The limited partner membership in a unit is diverse, containing different social groups that are reflective of the society within which a community operates.
Additionally, a unit contains members of the four main demographics: partnered males (A), partnered females (B), single males (C), and single females (D).
The 4 demographics in the branch form 4 groups, as follows:
- Group 1: partnered males and partnered females
- Group 2: single females and single males
- Group 3: partnered males and single males
- Group 4: partnered females and single females
Within each group, there are different subsets, known as classes, based primarily on age. There is a class for Nursery (0-2), toddlers (3 – 5), young children (6-9), pre-teens (10-12), teens (13-18), young adults (19-31), adults (32-72), and empty nesters (73+).
| Meeting week | Class 1 | Class 2 | Class 3 | Class 4 | Class 5 | Class 6 | Class 7 | Class 8 |
| Week 1 and 3 | All partnered adults | All single adults | Teen boys and girls | Pre -teens | Young children | Toddlers | Nursery | |
| Week 2 and 4 | All males | All females | Teen boys | Teen girls |
Further details on the composition of units, groups, classes, and branches, and their meeting schedules, is detailed here.
Recruitment and diversity
Captains are responsible for recruiting limited partners into the community through their council and by extension, branch. A captain does not recruit limited partners only from their demographic. Instead, they work to ensure that their recruits are diverse, considering social categorizations, gender, and social status, in addition to demographic groups.
Captains work in concert with their fellow captains in the branch presidency, and other presidencies in a village and district to ensure that the district is as diverse as possible. They are guided by present data on how diverse their district, village, and branch are, and what needs to be focused on to improve. They are also guided by community bylaws, which expressly require diversity as shown by demographic data about a population from which the community intends to recruit limited partners.
The captain serves as a service extension of the Human Relations Agency, though they also act as an interface between participants and other community agencies. For agencies that do not have operational presidencies, such agencies in the Economic and Public Administration Bureaus, captains come in handy in helping participants navigate these agencies’ automated system and other relevant tools used by the agency to deliver services.
The automated system is designed to help participants with all the help they need in matters related to various agencies, including the Human Relations Agency. However, should they run into problems, captains assist them in navigating the system, or direct them to relevant contractors who help them at a fee..
Automated system
For most of its duties, especially those that involve interaction with participants, the Health and Nutrition Agency is assisted by an automated system. Such tasks include the search for contractors to build, and develop training modules, and to assist the agency in rolling out and maintaining its insurance services. The automated system is designed to minimize human interference in the agency’s decision-making and interactions, and thereby eliminate human error and nepotism.
The system also leverages the information that the community handles, through big data computing and other means to aid in decision-making. The automated system helps the agency collect rent and maintenance fees. It also handles the payment of various obligations, such as loan repayments or payments to contractors who manage district buildings.
Contractors
The Health and Nutrition Agency extensively works through contractors to perform some tasks. These include those that the automated system cannot handle, or in instances where participants need assistance in navigating the automated system. Before developing the 24 buildings, the agency relies on contractors to survey and prepare land. It then contracts businesses with the relevant expertise to develop and maintain buildings, among other tasks.
Contractors also set up the automated system and help in drafting policies and strategies. Contractors also play a central role in preparing training modules, and in instances where the agency needs to proactively engage participants, such as in keeping fit, growing food, and becoming acquainted with health information.
Inter-agency cooperation
The 24 community agencies form three columns of 8 agencies each. There is loose collaboration between the agencies in a column. The Health and Nutrition Agency is part of the first column.
The Health and Nutrition Agency closely collaborates with the Human Relations Agency to ensure that new participants understand the essence of growing food and healthy lifestyles. The two agencies work to embed health training in the induction process. When providing insurance services, the Health and Nutrition Agency uses information collected by the Human Relations Agency to decide whether to offer these services and at what cost.
The Community Bank Agency (agency 7) provides loans that the Health and Nutrition Agency uses to build the district buildings. The transport Agency (agency 22) works with the Health and Nutrition Agency to ensure quick turnaround between food production and delivery to where it is consumed or further processed. The Health and Nutrition Agency works with the IP Agency (agency 13) to encourage more research in food production, and to develop more productive, healthier, and versatile crops and farming methods
Presidencies’ offices, meetings, and quarterly conferences
Offices
The Health and Nutrition Agency presidency has permanent dedicated offices in District Building 4’s first floor, on the western side. Facing them on the eastern side are the permanent dedicated offices for trustee presidency and Regulatory Bureau’s operational presidency serving the agency and District 4.
Trustees and the regulatory operational presidencies alternate their offices. Trustees have the offices in building 4 on Mondays and Wednesdays. Regulatory Bureau operational presidencies use the offices on Tuesdays and Thursdays, as shown in this timetable
| Building 4/ Health and Nutrition | Building 16/ Accounting | |
|---|---|---|
| Monday | Trustee presidency | Regulatory Bureau presidency |
| Tuesday | Regulatory Bureau presidency | Trustee presidency |
| Wednesday | Trustee presidency | Regulatory Bureau presidency |
| Thursday | Regulatory Bureau presidency | Trustee presidency |
The first floor’s layout is as follows, including other public servants who serve District 4.
Working hours and meetings
Agency presidents, trustees, and regulatory agency presidents work in their offices on a full-time basis. To allow for this, they are required to be at least 50 years of age, be experts in NewVistas concepts, an be semi or fully retired from their business. This allows them to dedicate much of their productive time to serving the community.
Other presidencies work from Monday to Thursday, from 8 – 8:45 AM. their offices are converted for this purpose, and can thereafter be used for other activities, such as office space for participants, hotel rooms and hospital consultation rooms. On Thursday, each presidency (four presidents serving A, B, C, and D) meets for a 45-minute meeting from 9:00 to 9:45 in the morning.
On the last Friday of each quarter, between 9:00 AM and 12:00 PM, each demographic presidency meets. The three-member presidency discusses common bureau matters that are of interest to the demographic they serve. On Saturday, again between 9:00 AM and 12:00 PM, the whole board meets, where the presidents present their input from the previous day’s demographic presidency meeting, and prepare for the quarterly conference. The aim is to have a cohesive presentation during the quarterly conference but tailored to specific demographic interests.
Quarterly conferences
Quarterly conferences are held on the last Sunday of each quarter, from 9:00 AM to 3:00 PM, with a lunch break in between. During quarterly conferences, each demographic presidency sits together in the same row.
Quarterly conferences are held in District Buildings 5 and 17. Each building has a lower and higher assembly court. The different demographic groups use the assembly courts as follows:
| Building | Assembly court | Demographic |
|---|---|---|
| 5 | Lower court | Partnered males (A) |
| 5 | Higher court | Partnered females (B) |
| 17 | Lower court | Single males (C) |
| 17 | Higher court | Single females (D) |
Branch presidencies do not attend quarterly conferences. Instead, they follow the relevant proceedings online alongside other participants.
Each of the four assembly courts has seats for 480 presidents representing the respective demographic. In the diagram below each of the 4 courts is illustrated. The ceiling of each court has an elliptical arch that enables agency presidents, who are the only ones who make a presentation during the conference, to speak without the need to amplify their voices. The 480 seats are easily rotatable to enable presidents to face whoever is speaking.
Each of the four courts has an identical arrangement and number of seats. The exact arrangement of each court can therefore be illustrated using one court, in this case, building 5’s lower court that is used by partnered males(A).
Within an assembly court, the 480 presidents are arranged in terms of demographic presidencies of 3. The District Bureau’s demographic presidency for partnered malesv(4A, 5A, and 6A) sits in the highlighted seats. Various district demographic presidencies also sit on the same row as indicated.
Some additional notes/definitions from an earlier version of this page:
- All community agencies, including the Health and Nutrition Agency, receive the capital they need for operations from the Capital Bank. The Capital Bank in turn obtains these funds from limited partners, who invest in the community through this bank as their partnership interest. Agencies are required to pay the Capital Bank a return on its investment so that it can in turn pay the ultimate investor – limited partners – a return. This means that agencies must strive to be economically viable, running at a profit that is healthy enough to pay their obligations, and still provide high-quality and affordable services to participants.
- There is a strong positive effect between the ability of a people to feed themselves, and their social and economic prosperity. This has been a major concern of the world in recent years, with tangible results where populations are well fed – Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa and South America are prime examples. The community is premised on this, among other ideals (Wang, X. and K. Taniguchi. Does better nutrition enhance economic growth? The economic cost of hunger. Conference. Rome: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, 2003).
- Organic food production has been found to be beneficial to human health. The excessive use of pesticides has negative effects on the environment and humans. At the same time, use of antibiotics in rearing animas has been found to contribute to the increase of drug-resistant bacteria, which again has negative health implications for humans. The community will prioritize quality over quantity, to have a food production effort which is socially, environmentally and economically sustainable (Mie, A. “Human health implications of organic food and organic agriculture: a comprehensive review.” Environmental health : a global access science source 16.1 (2017): 111).
- The United States and other developed countries’ focus on quantity in food production has directly led to diminishing nutritional value in produced food. This, in turn, leads to overconsumption, as well as negative effects on soil, water, and, more importantly, human health (Sassenrath, G. “Technology, complexity and change in agricultural production systems.” Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems 23.4 (2008): 285–295.
- According to FAO, organic agriculture reduces non-renewable energy use, by decreasing the need for agrochemicals. This in turn reduces the amount of greenhouse gases agricultural produce emits into the atmosphere, further mitigating climate change fueled by these emissions (FAO. What are the environmental benefits of organic agriculture? Working Group on Organic Agriculture. 2019: FAO, 2019).
- In advanced and newly advanced economies, the effects of agricultural extension services is well documented, especially the positive effects it has on food production. Supporting farmers with input and information improves their decision making, performance, and their ability to fund their communities. In the community, the Nutrition Agency will provide these services online, including guiding farmers on where they can get any other services from the community required to improve capacity (Ijatuyi, E., A. Omotayo and L. Mabe. “Effect of extension service(s) and socio-economic characteristics on the livelihood of Nguni cattle development project beneficiaries in North West Province: a tobit-ols regression approach.” South African Journal of Agricultural Extension (2017): dx.doi.org/10.17159/2413-3221/2017/v45n1a427).
- As was the case with Sri Lanka, absolute self-sustenance in food production does not always translate into economic prosperity and environmental sustainable agricultural practices. The community will be interested in only engaging in activities which play to its strengths, and importing what makes economic sense to (Davis, K., J. Gephart and T. Gunda. “Sustaining food self-sufficiency of a nation: The case of Sri Lankan rice production and related water and fertilizer demands.” Ambio 45.3 (2016): 302–312).
- Increased food production and technological advances have gradually pushed more people form agriculture. The result is that a majority of the world’s population suffers from malnutrition – undernutrition, lack of micronutrients, or obesity. The shift has also had a drastically damaging effect on the environment. In the community, more people being involved in agriculture will result in more variety, therefore better nutrition and value of food (FAO. The future of food and agriculture – Trends and challenges. Rome: FAO, 2017).
- Food production standards aim to provide equal protection to the consumers. Additionally, they also seek to level the playing field for all those affected by the standards through equitable implementation and monitoring. All those involved are also well informed of the standards and the logic behind their application (Gardner, S. Consumers and food safety: A food industry perspective. Rome: FAO, 1993).
- The community is extensively mapped and covered with high-definition cameras, which show every angle of the building, without infringing on privacy. For instance, special cameras with AI technology can easily detect falls before they happen, and alert other technological aids (such as robots) to prevent them. By analyzing data on human waste, body movement, and posture, the technology can diagnose cancer, stroke, and other illnesses that need to be discovered early to become treatable.[↩]
- The community may not always insist on having livestock if the cost-benefit analysis does not allow for it. For instance, in drier areas where freshwater is scarce, the community may only focus on crop farming, and source its animal products requirements from elsewhere.[↩]