Oxfam has filled its vacant fundraising director post, confirming that industry veteran Tim Hunter will be leaving Unicef in Switzerland to head up fundraising at the British charity.

Hunter (pictured) will replace acting fundraising director Andrew Barton, who was previously head of relationship marketing.

The appointment of Hunter marks a return at Oxfam to recruiting talent from within the charity sector. The previous director of fundraising and supporter marketing was Paul Clarke, appointed in June 2012 who had been working in commercial marketing before taking on the charity role. Clarke remained in post for less than a year.

Hunter, currently international director of fundraising at Unicef, will take up the post on 1 May. He was deputy to former NSPCC director of fundraising Giles Pegram before making the move to Geneva in 2008.

Hunter will arrive at an organisation undergoing change. Last July Oxfam announced that a fall in fundraising and shops income had led to a £17m year-on-year drop in total income, prompting the charity to launch an urgent appeal. This preceded the announcement in October that Oxfam would be cutting 125 jobs from its UK operation as part of a global restructure.

His arrival to the senior post comes nearly a year after Oxfam appointed a new chief executive, Mark Goldring who had previously led Mencap.

Goldring welcomed Hunter into the fold. “Tim is recognised as one of the top fundraisers in the UK and globally with an outstanding record of driving income growth,” he said. “I am really looking forward to working with Tim and benefitting from his wealth of experience."