Ross, together with his late Danish wife Hildur, is the founder/chairman of Gaia Trust, a Danish charitable association whose main projects to date have been supporting the fast-growing ecovillage movement, and in particular GEN, the Global Ecovillage Network, as well as supporting education for a sustainable future, and in particular, Gaia Education. Ross and Hildur have three children, Rolf, Thor and Frej.
Gaia Trust is self-financing, based originally on income earned from daughter company Gaiacorp that specialized in currency fund management. Gaiacorp was founded by Ross for the specific purpose of financing Gaia Trust in 1988. The methodolgy was based on Ross’s research into currency markets in the early 1980’s. This business was sold off in 2000.
GEN is a global network of autonomous regional ecovillage networks, which three major Regional Offices for the Western Hemisphere, Europe/Africa, and Asia/Oceania. There are several hundred members across the world.
How important is this embryonic ecovillage movement? Sociologist Ted Trainer of the University of New South Wales puts the question into historical perspective as follows:
Would it be an exaggeration to claim that the emergence of the ecovillage movement is the most significant event of the 20th century? I don’t think so.
Gaia Education’s curriculum was developed by ecovilage experts from around the world and is taught both as a 4-week course at many ecovillages and an 8-month on-line course in partnership with the Open University of Catalonia in Spain.
Read more about Gaia Trust at www.gaia.org
