Will Ruddick

Will Ruddick is the founder and director of Grassroots Economics, a non-profit foundation that seeks to empower marginalized communities to take charge of their own livelihoods and economic future. After completing graduate school researching high energy physics as a collaboration member at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, he found his passion in alternative economics and development work which brought him to Kenya. Since 2008 Will has lived in East Africa and managed several successful development programs in environment, food security and economic development. He is dedicated to connecting communities to their own abundance, and is an advocate for, and designer of, Complementary Currencies for poverty eradication and sustainable development. Will Ruddick has developed three Community Currency Programs in Kenya since 2010 and is the founder of the award winning Bangla-Pesa program and the recently launched Gatina-Pesa in Nairobi. He consults on Community Currencies worldwide and is currently training teams launching two community currencies in coordination with the University of Cape Town’s Environmental Economics Policy Research Unit. Mr. Ruddick is also an associate scholar with the University of Cumbria’s Institute for Leadership and Sustainability.