Frans C. Verhgen, M.Div., M.I.A., Ph.D., co-founder of Earth and Peace Education International (EPE) and founding President of the International Institute for Monetary Transformation (IIMT) is a sustainability sociologist with training and experience in divinity, international affairs, and applied sociology. After working in Ghana (1963-68), he studied international trade and economics at Columbia University to complete a Ph.D. in international development. He has used this training mostly in secondary and tertiary education in the metro New York area and presently teaches a course on sustainable community development at Pace University. In 2009, he founded the International Institute for Monetary Transformation and is now pursuing the development and implementation of the Tierra Solution, a carbon-based international monetary system to combat climate change through low carbon and climate-resilient development. He is the convener of the International Peace Research Association (IPRA)’s Ecology and Peace Commission and represents IPRA at UN Headquarters, where he is founding chair of the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development’s Working Group on Monetary Transformation.
