90% of the agricultural lands in the Bahamas is owned by the government. These lands that have always been marginal for growing things, over the next twenty years, will become prime real estate for development. As incomes explode, people acquire a 'live anywhere' capability and retired baby boomers also find they can live anywhere, every nook and cranny will get developed.
However, the Bahamas represents some of the best opportunities anywhere. The Acklins archipelago is about 200 square miles and has a grand total of about 800 people living there. The archipelago has over two hundred miles of shoreline and when developed will likely hold a population of over 1.7 million. Samana Cay is about 17 square miles and is uninhabited. It will likely be developed into something like the Hamptons and be home to about 100,000. Mayaguana is 105 square miles and will likely accommodate nearly 1,000,000 population.
The key issue is that the Bahamian government, who currently owns all this land and claims sovereignty over it until very recently seemed to be cooperating with the the inevitable process. They had created a joint venture with Boston's I-Group to develop a significant portion of Mayaguana. This, in combination with the Honduran free state initiative, was suggesting that at least some of the nations that would be attractive to boutique village developers were behaving in an enlightened and cooperative manner.
It was with sadness, then, that I learned today that the I-Group Mayaguana project has fallen through. This has disturbed at least some Bahamians as well. It is inevitable that The Bahamas will fill up with Knowledge Class Professionals from around the world. The land that it will require has a current market value of over 50 billion 2012USD and most of it is owned by the government. That is a huge sum of money for a government that currently has a 1.7 billion annual budget. It is only a matter of time before pure economics will move the discussion and prevailing attitudes toward development.
When developed, the real estate will have a value of nearly 25 trillion dollars. This is a staggering sum that will motivate people to extraordinary acts. It is possible that the Bahamas may be the first nation to fall to the Information Age, perhaps violently. It may be the first nation to be conquered by an NGO. Or it could be that interested parties will corrupt the government with piles of money just to big to ignore. Again, an enlightened government should learn from history, bow to the inevitable and create a strategy that maximizes their outcome.
Equitopia Productions is exciting. Mycroft's Business Lounge will be fun. However, for flat out size and affluence generation, nothing will compare with the Boutique Villages. As Thomas A. Stewart says, we are at the beginning of the biggest real estate boom in all of history. Furthermore, he underestimates its size by at least a factor of four. Over the next thirty years, Western civilization, alone, will build over a quadrillion dollars of real estate. That is enough money to create a million billionaires.
Of course, my interest is not primarily monetary. I want to build Polymathican villages, specifically designed to facilitate and enhance a Finely Crafted Life for people of refinement and erudition. The schools will be polymathic, the products in the retail shops will be refined, the neighbors will be refined and erudite. Yes, a few visionaries who design and build these villages will become very wealthy. However, thousands, even millions of people will have a home and that is of greater importance.
The first village will be somewhere in the Caribbean. The Bahamas are the most convenient, but if the government will not cooperate, we can build elsewhere. If Honduras can tolerate Libertarians, they should definitely welcome us. Over time, however, the Polymathican global culture will likely reach a population of over 15 million and will require the construction of 500 villages. That is enough so that we can build them in the tropics, in the temperate zones, near the ocean, in the mountains and on the plains. We can make them urban, suburban and exurban.
As with all of the projects that I am initiating, if you are interested in participating in the planning, design and/or construction boutique villages for Polymathicans, drop me your e-mail address and I will put you on my private lists and venues. I cannot and do not want to be everywhere at once, so leadership opportunities abound.
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