Ric Goodman’s focus is on solutions to extreme poverty and vulnerability, often in hard to reach areas. He completed a master’s degree in protected area management at the University of Wales, focussing on social and economic development in the high mountain areas of the Himalaya and Andes. He broadened his work to provide goods and services to populations in remote areas, often in fragile ecosystems and environments, where people’s livelihoods are inherently fragile.

Since then he has lived around the world, in Latin America, Africa and Asia for more than 15 years, working on programmes providing cash and income generating skills and assets directly to vulnerable families, often combined with social and technical support, supporting basic needs and increased economic activity. “It’s crucial that social protection transfers are predictable, so people can rely on them and plan for the most productive ways to spend and invest in their families’ futures”, he says.

Most recently, Ric has been Team Leader for the DAI-managed Hunger Safety Net Programme in Kenya since 2014. HSNP provides long-term cash transfers to targeted families and uses remote sensed data to scale up to in response to the earliest signs of drought, assisting more than 2 million people in arid northern Kenya.

• M.Sc., protected landscape management, Aberystwyth University
• B.Sc., engineering science, University of Warwick