Education
Adams attended King Edward VI Five Ways school in Birmingham.
- Photos
- Works
- Photos
- Works
Richard Adams
Edit ProfileCareer
He has degrees in sociology (Street John"s College, Durham University), theology (University of London) and business administration (Newcastle University) which also conferred an honorary Doctorate of Civil Law on him in 2005 as did Durham in 2007. After visiting small farmers in Gujarat, India, in 1973 he established Agrofax Labour Intensive Products, an agricultural imports company in London with distribution to the main wholesale markets. In 1974 this business began importing crafts from farming communities in Bangladesh, following which he founded Tearcraft which became the marketing arm of the United Kingdom relief and development charity, Tearfund.
In 1979 Richard established the independent company Traidcraft, which became a plc in 1984, offering the first "alternative" and socially orientated public share issue in the United Kingdom. In 1989 Adams convened the steering committee of what became the United Kingdom"s Fairtrade Foundation, based on the Dutch Max Havelaar Foundation.
In 1994 Adams founded the Creative Consumer Company-operative, through which Out of this World, Britain"s first chain of organic grocery stores with an explicit ethical, fair trade, social and environmental agenda, were launched. In 2000 he co-founded the Warm Zone programme to combat fuel poverty and in 2006 was appointed as a non-executive director of Newcastle upon Tyne National Health Service Primary Care Trust and in 2010 was appointed Chair of Newcastle and North Tyneside Community Health.
Adams was a director of the United Kingdom Social Investment Forum 1992-1996. Chair of the Student Christian Movement 1994-1997 and, with Mark Hayes, a co-initiator and founding director of the social investment society, Shared Interest.
In this role he works mainly on energy and climate related issues.
Achievements
-
He is an honorary Fellow of Glasgow University"s Centre for Social and Environmental Accounting Research (CSEAR), a Fellow of Street John"s College, Durham and received an Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire in 2000 for services to ethical business.He won the New Statesman Social Entrepreneur of the Year award in 2005 and in 2006 was listed by The Independent newspaper as one of the top 50 people in the United Kingdom who had had most impact in "making the world a better place" for his development of the concept of ethical shopping.
Membership
He was a member of its board from 1992 - 1999. He was appointed by the United Kingdom Government in 2001 as one of 24 United Kingdom members of the Brussels–based Economic and Social Committee of the European Union, serving for 14 years and is now a Delegate to the EESC"s Committee on Industrial Change. He was co-chair of the European Nuclear Energy Forum(ENEF) from 2011-2014 and is a member of the Corporate Responsibility Stakeholder Council of RWE AG.
