Following the New Zealand speaking tour of German author Prof Dr Margrit Kennedy in 2002, the Living Economies Educational Trust was formed as a nationwide organisation aiming to strengthen and help sustain regional economies by promoting interest-free means of exchange - currencies based on and respecting the living systems of our planet - to complement money in local communities.

The Trust welcomes enquiries about currency models and resource materials, and provides support for those wishing to explore and implement currency systems appropriate for their communities.

Living Economies is registered as a charity under the Charities Act. Our registration number is CC 38114. 

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

Helen Dew

Helen’s awareness of the potential of complementary currencies for environmental, social and economic wellbeing began in 1991 when she joined the Wairarapa Green Dollar Exchange.

In 2002 she became a founding member of the Living Economies board and the New Zealand distributor of Margrit Kennedy’s Interest and Inflation Free Money, the first of a growing list of titles now available through the Living Economies online bookstore.

Helen is a keen networker, her attendance at international conferences on currencies in Germany (2003) and New York (2004) initiating ever-widening contacts with others committed to researching and promoting local and global currency projects.

Helen was project manager for the New Zealand edition of Fleeing Vesuvius, published by Living Economies in August 2011.

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12 Costley St, Carterton 5713, New Zealand 0064 6 379 8034

Margaret Jefferies

Margaret has been the Chair of Project Lyttelton for over ten years, working to create a vibrant sustainable community.

Living Economies introduced Margaret to the ideas of complementary currencies and to the direct role our current monetary system has in causing many of today’s global issues. She has been a member of its board since 2003.

Inspired by the concept of Time Banking while attending a complementary currency conference in upstate New York in 2004, Margaret instigated New Zealand’s first Time Bank in Lyttelton. The success of the Lyttelton Time Bank is spawning Time Banks throughout the country – as well as in Australia and Uruguay.

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5 Foster Tce, Lyttelton 8082, New Zealand 0064 3 328 9260

Bryan Innes

Bryan has been a permaculture design certificate teacher since 1996. He and his partner Jo mounted the four Ecoshows initiating the launch of Transition Towns NZ and the 2012 Permaculture Convergence.

Bryan is a trustee of Awhi Turangi Trust, a centre of sustainable practice working on experimental building systems, creation of livelihoods, food production and providing tertiary education as a hub of Otago Polytechnic. Bryan attended a community currencies conference in Weimar, Germany in 2006 after he visited the JAK Bank in Sweden to study interest-free banking. He created an interest-free community economy system based on reciprocity known as the Genuine Wealth System.

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Laurence Boomert

Laurence lives in Golden Bay. He works on projects to advance sustainability and community wellbeing, aligning with the relocalisation focus of Transition Towns. During the 1990s he developed the NZ Environmental Business Network, promoting entrepreneurial solutions to our contemporary challenges. He currently runs the Bank of Real Solutions, a database of community can-do success stories. He has dedicated himself to studying contingency planning options for New Zealand against the advent of system collapse. 

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Phil Stevens

Phil has spent years as a professional musician, recording engineer and producer, computer systems and network engineer and avid do-it-yourselfer.

Having grown up among the rugged borderlands of Arizona with a deep regard for the delicate balance imposed by resource scarcity, Phil emigrated to New Zealand with his family in 2005 to pursue a more self-sufficient lifestyle and develop community networks.

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Murray Stentiford 

With an education and professional work experience in science, engineering and IT, Murray has also been a professional musician in several genres. 

He has had a long involvement in holistic education programmes, holding several positions of responsibility in voluntary organisations. He is a keen student of processes that enhance communication and wellbeing, such as NonViolent Communication and Coaching.