Jayampathy “Chari” Ratwatte, Jr., is from Kandy, a central province in the hill country of Sri Lanka. His concern for the lives of the less fortunate was cultivated early on by his father, who worked as a civil servant and in the citizen sector on social and economic development for many years, and who took his family on numerous travels to the poorest, most underdeveloped parts of the country.

Yet his interest in the trials of rice paddy farmers may well be “something in the blood,” as Ratwatte puts it. After founding Rural Returns, he discovered that his paternal great-grandfather participated in Sri Lanka’s Third Agricultural Conference in 1928, where he emphasized that the paddy land owner “must get a return on his investment.” A maternal uncle still cultivates rice on the family lands and presses government researchers to pay greater attention to crop diversity.

After graduating from Manchester Metropolitan University, UK, with a degree in information systems, Ratwatte served for five years as software developer, leader of the global software support team, and then business analyst for Millennium Information Technologies in Sri Lanka. He enrolled at the Stanford Graduate School of Business with many questions as to what career direction he wanted to follow, and it was there that he joined forces with his childhood friend DC Jayasundera, who was attending the Stanford Civil and Engineering Program, to create Rural Returns.

“I want to achieve real sustainable poverty alleviation that helps the world’s rural poor find for themselves something they very rarely have: choices,” Ratwatte says.

Ratwatte is launching the effort with the help of the Stanford Social Innovation Fellowship.