Hugh Raven

Non-Executive Director

Hugh brings to Finance Earth over 30 years of experience in land management, environmental conservation, and philanthropic governance, with a particular focus on Scotland’s natural environment.

Hugh is Managing Director of his family’s business, Ardtornish Estate, and is a current or former Non-Executive Director of six Scottish land-based businesses, covering some 80,000 hectares.

He is a Trustee and Development Committee Chair of Scotland’s leading marine laboratory, the Scottish Association for Marine Science, and he founded and chairs the radical campaigning charity Open Seas.

Hugh co-founded and chairs the Highlands and Islands Environment Foundation, raising and distributing charitable funds for community environmental action in the region. He was Environment Lead Trustee, and later Chair, of the John Ellerman Foundation, and chaired Scotland’s Moorland Forum, convening almost 30 voluntary and statutory organisations expert in Scotland’s predominant habitat type. His Letter from Caledonia is a regular column in British Wildlife magazine.

Hugh also chairs the Advisory Committee and the Scotland Advisory Group to the Environmental Funders’ Network, the network for the UK’s leading environmental philanthropists and charitable trusts.

Formerly a Board Member of Scottish Natural Heritage, the RSPB, and Crown Estate Scotland, Hugh was also Chair of the Marine Conservation Society, a Commissioner of the UK’s Sustainable Development Commission, and a Member of the BBC’s Rural and Agricultural Affairs Advisory Committee. He has advised the UK Foreign Secretary on environmental matters, and was Environment Advisor to the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation. He divides his time between Argyll and London.

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