Our Team

Dr. Tint Lwin Thaung, Executive Director

James Bampton, Manager, Program Coordination, Monitoring, and Evaluation

With 18 years of practical forest field experience, much of it working directly with forest communities in Latin America, Africa and Asia, Mr. Bampton joined RECOFTC in 2007 as the Chief Technical Advisor for a flagship capacity building project in Cambodia. The Cambodia project resulted in enabling more than 2,000 trainees to contribute to the development of 240 community forests in seven provinces in the country and a high-level engagement with the national government. Soon, a full-fledged country program took root in Cambodia with multiple national and regional projects. In 2009, James became the overall Manager for Program Coordination, Monitoring and Evaluation at RECOFTC , with the task of ensuring synergy across RECOFTC's entire program and develop functioning Country Programs in our other focal countries. Prior to this, he had spent five years as a lead advisor to the Livelihoods and Forestry Program in Nepal and three years working with communities in the heart of the Brazilian Amazon. James has an MSc in Forestry from Oxford University, United Kingdom, and studied senior management at the Open University, United Kingdom.  

Sanjiv Ray, Manager, Corporate Services

Mr. Ray has managed finance, administration, and human resource functions at RECOFTC since June 2005. With more than 22 years experience working in large multinationals and the non-profit sector, he has shaped the Center's financial strategy and significantly expanded corporate services to keep pace with the needs of a quickly growing organization. Prior to joining the Center, he was a General Manager at Tata Share Registry in India. As the business head of the company's payroll and funds outsourcing business, he handled major multinational and domestic accounts. From 2002 to 2004, he headed the Accounts department of the UK aid agency DFID, managing finance and treasury functions for its India operations. Sanjiv has worked with Escorts Finance in India and the Saud Bahwan group in Muscat, Oman following a long tenure from 198 9-1998 in the Accounts and Finance department with one of India's premier steel companies, Tata Steel. He also had a short stint as Audit Officer with PWC in India at the start of his professional career. He did is Bachelor's in Commerce and Accounting from St. Xavier's College in Ranchi, India and qualified as a Chartered Accountant from the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India in 1988.

Ronnakorn Triraganon, Manager, Capacity Building and Technical Services

Mr. Ronnakorn Triraganon has been working in the community-based natural resource management sector since 1980. He began his career doing field work on Community Forestry with the Thai Royal Forest Department, joining RECOFTC in 1996. He has extensive experience promoting local people’s knowledge and customary rights to ensure sustainable natural resource management and fair distribution of benefits through participatory approaches.

With his professional background in forestry and extensive experience in promoting local participation in natural resource management in the last few decades, Ronn is one of the most experienced trainers in his subject in the region. He has trained a number of community forestry practitioners at all levels of government and civil society from different parts of the world. He also has been involved in capacity building program developments for several projects working to promote community- based natural resource management in South and Southeast Asia, and Eastern Africa.