The Current Innovations’ team has significant experience in non-cash and exchange models including trade, barter and complementary currencies. Additional relevant experience also includes technology, finance, marketing and sales, economic ecology and sustainability, philanthropy and social enterprise.

Management

Annette Riggs
Ms. Riggs is a Founder, Board member and our Executive Director. She has over 20 years of experience with non-cash trade models such as complementary currency and exchange systems.  Ms. Riggs has in-depth knowledge of the infrastructure, processes, organizations and leadership within the $8 billion commercial barter industry and has applied this expertise for the social benefit of communities and economic ecology. She is an educator and valued speaker contributing most recently to the PlanetWork conferences, 2004 Green Festival, 2005 International Reciprocal Trade Association (IRTA) global conference, 2006 Regional Localization Networking Conference, and 2005 & 06 BALLE Annual Conferences.

Susan Pearn
Ms. Pearn is our Director of Operational Development. She has over twenty years of experience in companies ranging from large, multinational packaged goods firms to emerging businesses, including non-cash trading systems. Her functional depth encompasses business and financial strategy, alliance and partnership creation, and marketing and team development in both business-to-business and business-to-consumer organizations. More recently she has directed her efforts to social enterprises believing they can be both life serving and financially sustainable.

Board

Jim Fournier
Mr. Fournier is a Founder and Board member. He is a co-principal of PlanetWork, which produced the first international conference on global ecology and information technology.  He has worked as an industrial designer, entrepreneur, software developer, systems analyst and industrial ecologist. He is co-chair of the Sustainable Planet Grants Committee at the Threshold Foundation and serves on several advisory boards including the Meru Foundation, Buckminster Fuller Institute, and Perrinsville Group.

Jonathan Frieman
Mr. Frieman is a Founder and Board member. Holding both a law degree and a Master of Public Administration, he has been a significant contributor in both the founding and formalizing of Current Innovations public benefit status and social benefit vision. He specializes in non-profit corporation start-ups and is very generous in sharing both his professional expertise and his spirit. He formed a foundation that works with teens and children, and helped start the Center for Corporate Policy, which addresses the legal structure of corporations. He is president of the board of InSpirit and serves on the boards of Amazon Watch and Strategic Energy Innovations.

Advisors

Edgar Cahn
Mr. Cahn is the creator of Time Dollars and the founder of the Time Dollar Institute. He is as the co-founder of the National Legal Services Program and the Antioch School of Law (now the David A. Clarke School of Law). He is the author of several books, including "No More Throw Away People". His own life is an example of dedication to strongly held principles and ideals, and he brings a powerful vision, sincere compassion, spontaneous humor, and the ability to inspire others.

Tom Greco
Mr. Greco is an author, consultant and educator, and the founder and Director of the Community Information Resource Center (CIRC), which provides guidance to communities seeking to develop sustainable economic and social structures. In North America he is regarded as a leading expert on community economic development, monetary theory, and local currencies.

Bernard Lietaer
Dr. Lietaer is a professor and the author of four books, including "The Future of Money".  He served as a Senior Executive at the Central Bank in Belgium to design and implement the single European Currency Unit (ECU, the forerunner to the Euro) and as President of Belgium's Electronic Payment System, credited as the most comprehensive and cost effective payment system in the world.

Richard Logie
Mr. Logie is the Founder and CEO of The Business Exchange, a multi-service trade exchange based in Aberdeen, Scotland. Recognized for his significant contributions to the commercial barter industry, Mr. Logie has been instrumental in assisting Current Innovations in adapting the GETS trading platform, as both a visionary and lead developer.  An engineer by training, and an entrepreneur and social benefit contributor by passion, he offers his considerable talents and expertise to industry associations and to other exchange practitioners, as he continues to contribute to the evolution of the barter/exchange industry.