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Multiparty barter trading

for countries with shortage of forign currency reserves
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May be this is baked, but I will give it a try anyway.

Sometimes it happens that some countries do not have forigh currency reserves but they do need to purchase things from international market. They can do barter trading in such case. Ex. some years back, a south amercan country bought computers from Russia using sheeps instead of currency. This saves currency reserves for both countries.

What if Russia did not want sheeps ? In this case it is possible to involve a third country which can take sheep from other country and give Russia what it wanted. So this will be a 3-party barter trade. What if this third country which had need for sheeps but still could not give russia what it wanted ?.. Involve 4th country. ! This can goto <n> countries.

This way a large number of international trades can be achieved without spending a single doller of hard currency.

VJW, Jul 19 2011

LETS http://en.wikipedia...ange_trading_system
[normzone, May 17 2013]

[link]






       What an excellent idea. But making sure the trades are equitable to both parties may be tricky; it may be useful to assign some notional, arbitrary value to the items being exchanged. Thus both parties benefit, as they know they are not being cheated.   

       Perhaps these notional values could be given a temporary and non-pejorative "friendly name", such as "Dollar" or "Euro" ?
8th of 7, Jul 19 2011
  

       You're going to end up with some very high-mileage sheep.   

       //Mutli party// I've been to one of those.
lurch, Jul 19 2011
  

       No, [8th], it would be much better to use large stones with holes in. For one thing, they're harder to cart around in large quantities, severly hampering black sheep market activities.
Alterother, Jul 21 2011
  

       it can go on for <n> countries so long as there are at least <n> unique commodities that lead in a string from X to Y. Since the market is not frictionless I imagine that the losses in such a transaction would only appeal to dictators in banana republics with gross surpluses of bananas and in desperate need of sub machine guns.
WcW, Jul 21 2011
  

       Similar to LETS i think, but LETS is more efficient and there is a world LETS (or was).
nineteenthly, Jul 21 2011
  

       LETS: Yes. LETS is better, i Think. It can be done for countries too. UN/UNESCO or some similar oranization can play the role of central agency.   

       I think this would be especially great for poor african countries. They may have natural resources such as ores etc. which they can barter.   

       // losses in such a transaction //   

       I suspect that the losses may not be significant.
VJW, Jul 22 2011
  

       then you don't understand commodities.
WcW, Jul 22 2011
  

       I wonder if either country still has the sheeps or the computers.   

       Most barter also involves a kicker and some tax, both of which get paid in currency most times.   

       paperbackswap.com is the best barter site I know, but countries would never deal so small and simple.
popbottle, May 16 2013
  

       What I find amusing is VJW (who's reasonably erudite) posting in "menospeakadaenglish".   

       [marked-for-deletion] this is what cargo companies do.
FlyingToaster, May 16 2013
  

       Did you mean cargo cults?
normzone, May 17 2013
  
      
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