The Wildlife Trusts thank Peta Foxall for five years’ brilliant support and welcome a new chair, Duncan Ingram

The Wildlife Trusts thank Peta Foxall for five years’ brilliant support and welcome a new chair, Duncan Ingram

Yesterday, The Wildlife Trusts appointed a new Chair, Duncan Ingram, to succeed Peta Foxall who had completed her five year term.
A portrait of Peta Foxall, former chair of The Wildlife Trusts

Peta Foxall © Daniel Thistlethwaite

The Wildlife Trusts are indebted to Peta who did a fantastic job of guiding and supporting the movement of 46 Wildlife Trusts as they developed a new 10-year strategy. 

Duncan Ingram brings extensive knowledge and experience in federal governance gained through his work for the YMCA and he is passionate about the countryside and nature. As a group director at BT, Duncan was responsible for the programme delivering all the fixed and mobile telecommunications for the London Olympics which was essential for the success of the Games.   

Duncan is now on the board of the World YMCA where he has successfully led agreement across 160 countries to major constitutional changes to modernise and streamline its governance. Duncan understands complex institutions both from a national and international perspective.  

As vice chair of YMCA England & Wales – the umbrella charity for the over 100 local YMCA charities – Duncan led a commission collaboratively developing a new model of respective roles and responsibilities for the federation to work to.  

Duncan is a keen walker and trekker and is passionate about the natural world. He travels long distances to visit ancient trees and enjoys accompanying his wife on fungi expeditions. 

Duncan Ingram

Duncan Ingram says: 

“I am thrilled to have been elected chair of The Wildlife Trusts and look forward to supporting its crucial work in bringing wildlife back, empowering people to take action and combatting the climate and nature emergency. The scale of the climate emergency, the loss of our natural environment and its importance to our wellbeing means that the work of The Wildlife Trusts has never been more important.” 

Duncan succeeds biomedical scientist, Peta Foxall, who has given five years of unwavering support and has made an enormous contribution to The Wildlife Trusts. Peta is now going on to be a senior independent trustee of the NHS Confederation. 

Craig Bennett

Craig Bennett (c) Trai Anfield

Craig Bennett, chief executive of The Wildlife Trusts says: 

“Peta has championed a strong sense of wellbeing for all our staff and brought her extensive knowledge in this area to the fore. She was, and continues to be, a great supporter of The Wildlife Trusts and we’ll all miss her wise and warm counsel – we have so much to be grateful to her for. 

“We’re thrilled to welcome Duncan and we’re all really looking forward to working with him. He understands the strength of our federal structure and how we can further develop the influence and standing of the movement – as well as our joint capacity to be more than the sum of our parts in the fight against climate change and nature loss. 

“In the years ahead, it’ll be important to continue to work locally and nationally, but also to develop and strengthen international ties with like-minded organisations overseas. It’s essential to build influence globally because international co-operation is key in addressing the climate and nature emergency.” 

Editor’s notes

See ‘The Wildlife Trusts welcome new Chair, Peta Foxall’, November 2017, here