The idea behind JointWinWin is a simple one:

Whatever, whenever, whereever you buy, you make a difference.

0.8% came about for a multitude of reasons:

Affordable For All Businesses

Every business in the world can afford to donate a minimum of 0.8% of their gross turnover to charity. If you are in a business which cannot, you are very soon to be out of a job so prepare your resume/CV. At the moment, there is a growing movement of businesses interested in "fair trade", "carbon neutral", "corporate social responsibility" initiatives and the numbers involved are growing steadily. JointWinWin is a new community offering all businesses the opportunity to stand together as one to say, we are businesses giving back.

0.8% will allow the smallest of the small businesses and the largest of the large public companies. Shareholders are ever more concerned not just with growth of their shares but also in their companies duty of social responsibility. Business giving back is good business. Period.

Lucky Number

China is the largest economy with the highest population on the planet. You may have noticed HSBC using the "lucky number 8" (8 is considered highly auspicious in China) in their advertising, who am I to not give a nod to the largest group of prospects and customers on on the planet ;-)

Putting Governments To Shame

In 1970 at a General Assembly Resolution, rich nations promised 0.7% of their gross national product for development. After 35 years and little traction (as of 2005) here are the league table of the countries signed up "committed" to making a change to the world, ending poverty and hunger:

Source: http://www.unmillenniumproject.org/documents/07_OECD_2005.pdf

Well done to Norway, Sweden, Luxembourg, Netherlands and Denmark. "Could do better, a lot better" for the remainder.

Which brings me to the most important point. We as business owners and entrepreneurs can create a ground swell from the bottom up. We can show our respective governments the way by hitting a minimum of 0.8% and leading by example. We as a community of businesses can make a difference and change the world, one purchase at a time.

We don't have to wait for our governments to make a difference, we can show them how it's done.