Ray Purcell is an experienced international development expert. Originally an agricultural economist, he worked in Tanzania and Botswana as a civil servant and has since worked for over 30 years as a consultant. His strengths now are in national and sector strategic planning, climate change adaptation relating to sectoral policy and budgeting planning and management; programme and project design, and reviews and evaluations, especially in the rural development and livelihoods areas. Ray has extensive experience of supporting the preparation processes of national and sector strategic plans, including the last two Rwanda national development plans), and the preparation of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Vulnerability Assessment Strategic Plan in 2016. His recent work has focused on the integration of climate change into government planning and budgeting processes in South East Asia (Cambodia, Thailand and Lao PDR). In 2018/19, Ray worked with UNEP and GEF on preparing for Building the Capacity of the Lao PDR Government to Advance the National Adaptation Planning Process. In 2021/22, he worked with UNEP on a GCF climate change readiness proposal for Angola and on strengthening the mainstreaming of Ecosystems Based Adaptation (EbA) in The Gambia. In 2023, Ray worked on a review of a Dutch Government global Land-at-Scale mid term review, and is currently working for UNICEF Mozambique on climate impacts on child development.