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Discover best practices and trends from the Latin American and Caribbean private sector shared by IDB Invest specialists in agribusiness, climate change, development impact, energy, financial institutions, gender, transportation, and more.

 

Blog authors

  • Sofía Ahualli

    Sofía Ahualli is a Blended Finance Investment Officer in the Financial Products and Services Division at IDB Invest. She specializes in origination, structuring and execution of blended finance investments, focusing on achieving impactful outcomes in climate mitigation and adaptation, as well as gender, diversity and inclusion. Previously, Sofía worked at the Executive Director's Office for Argentina and Haiti at the IDB. Prior joining the IDB Group, she held various roles in investment, research and credit analysis for a financial service firm, the Argentina Ministry of Economy, and a global asset manager. Sofía holds a master’s degree in quantitative finance from Universidad de Alcala and a bachelor degree in economics from Universidad Católica Argentina.

  • Sofía Perazzo

    Sofia Perazzo, Vice President of Sustainability of Tropicalia and President of Fundación Tropicalia. She leads the sustainability practice and strategies at Tropicalia – a sustainable luxury tourism real estate development in northeast Dominican Republic owned by Cisneros. She works across departments and functions to ensure that Tropicalia’s social and environmental commitments are integrated in business decisions that influence operations, construction, design, community development, environmental, legal and human resources teams. Since 2011, Sofia leads the production of Tropicalia’s annual sustainability report, and supports local stakeholder engagement and communications strategies in the Dominican Republic. She is also President of Fundacion Tropicalia, an NGO she helped establish in 2008 and has been an integral player to its development over the past 15 years. Sofia has a bachelor’s degree from the University of California, Santa Barbara, double majoring in Political Science and Global Studies, concentrating in Latin American Culture and Ideology; a master’s degree from New York University in Global Studies: International Business and Economic Development; a certificate degree from Harvard Business School in Corporate Social Responsibility and is GRI certified.

  • Sophie Sirtaine

    Sophie is the CEO of CGAP, an international partnership housed in the World Bank Group, dedicated to promoting inclusive financial ecosystems that enable a green, resilient, and equitable world for all. Sophie has dedicated her professional career to the development of inclusive and sustainable financial ecosystems around the world, with more than twenty years of experience at the World Bank, where she has held different positions, including Director of Strategy and Operations at the Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) and Director for the Caribbean region. Previously, Sophie worked as an expert in financial sector development and stability in Europe, Latin America, and Asia. Among others, she led various Financial Sector Assessment Programs (FSAPs) in various countries in Europe, Central Asia, and Latin America, and she was the Manager who led the World Bank's response to banking crises in various countries of the European Union during the global financial crisis of 2008-2011. Prior to joining the World Bank, Sophie worked in JP Morgan's Financial Institutions (FIG) team on Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A) in Europe, and for Halcrow Fox and Associates' Infrastructure team. Sophie holds a Masters in Economics from the London School of Economics (LSE).

  • Stefan Wright

    Stefan es oficial líder de Inversión en Turismo de BID Invest. Ingresó en 2016, y su trabajo se enfoca en la ejecución de transacciones financieras en América Latina y el Caribe. Cuenta con más de diez años de experiencia en el Grupo BID, durante los cuales generó soluciones de deuda y capital innovadoras, estructuró proyectos complejos e integró servicios de asesoría en sus transacciones orientadas al desarrollo sostenible. Antes de ingresar al Grupo BID, Stefan pasó cuatro años como director ejecutivo de Near Shore Solutions Inc. en Jamaica, recaudando capital y brindando servicios de asesoría financiera. Previamente, Stefan pasó siete años en banca de inversión, durante los cuales ejecutó transacciones de deuda y capital, además de prestar servicios de asesoría en fusiones y adquisiciones en Bank of America Securities en Nueva York. Stefan tiene una maestría en administración de empresas (MBA, por sus siglas en inglés) con énfasis en finanzas de la Universidad de Nueva York (EE.UU.), y un título de pregrado en contabilidad de la Universidad de las Indias Occidentales (Jamaica).

  • Stefano Pereira

    Stefano Pereira is Senior Development Impact Advisor at FinDev Canada where he is a contributor the organization’s thought leadership agenda. Prior to joining FinDev Canada, he worked in the Development Effectiveness Division at IDB Invest. His areas of research include private sector development, productivity and green economics and his work has been featured in books, technical papers and academic journals. He holds an M.A. in Economics from the University of Toronto and B.A. in Economics from the University of the West Indies.

  • Stephanie Eder

    Stephanie is an Investment Officer in the Blended Finance Team at IDB Invest. In the course of her career of more than ten years in the IDB Group, she has participated in structuring projects for investment funds with financial institutions and has analyzed investment projects for financial institutions. Before joining the IDB Group, she was an auditor at Deloitte & Leitner in Vienna, Austria. She earned a master’s degree in international relations and international economics from Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (USA) and a master’s degree in international business from the University of Applied Sciences Kufstein (Austria).

  • Stephanie Oueda

    Stephanie is the head of gender and diversity at IDB Invest, based in Washington, D.C. At IDB Invest, our goal is to improve lives. As Head of Gender and Diversity, Stephanie's role is to ensure that all operations have a positive impact in leading to a more gender-balanced society. Mainly, she focuses on the empowerment of women, although the role also covers the empowerment of men in the Caribbean. Under her leadership, this area of the organization now works on programs to include other underrepresented groups and increase other dimensions of diversity in order to work towards a more inclusive society. For example, the inclusion of people of African descent, LGBT +, indigenous people and people with disabilities. Stephanie has two master's degrees, one in economics and one in political science from the University of Montreal and the Sorbonne University, respectively.

  • Stephen Thomas

    Stephen leads the Financial Institutions Team for the Caribbean region at IDB Invest, which he joined in 2019. He is responsible for originating and structuring financing transactions for financial intermediaries that have an impact on development, by increasing access to financing, fostering women’s empowerment and supporting climate change mitigation programs, among others. Before joining the IDB Group, Stephen led teams focused on equity brokerage, investment advisory and wealth management for First Citizens in Trinidad and Tobago, St. Lucia and Barbados. He previously worked as Debt Capital Markets Head of Citicorp Merchant Bank Limited, covering clients across the wider English-speaking Caribbean region. Stephen earned a master’s degree in business administration (MBA) from the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University, Washington D.C. (USA) and an undergraduate degree in economics from the University of the West Indies.

  • Su Hyun Kim

    Su Hyun Kim is a Sustainable MSME Consultant at the Advisory Service Division (ADV) of IDB Invest. She works on advisory projects that provides guidance and action plans for IDB Invest client companies to transform their operations and value chain into a sustainable one. She also works in knowledge product creation related to sustainable value chain, circular economy, silver economy, sustainability indicators, and other topics. Prior to joining IDB Invest, Su Hyun held positions related to technical assistance and advisory projects in the World Bank and IDB. She holds a Masters of Public Affairs from Cornell University and a Master of Business Administration from Columbia Business School.

  • Sumiko Andrade

    Sumiko Andrade is a Corporate Affairs and Transparency Officer in the Risk Department at IDB Invest. Before taking on this role, she worked in the Office of Evaluation and Oversight at the IDB Group, where she primarily focused on evaluations related to the private sector. Her experience includes work in impact investment funds, origination, analysis, and assessment of transactions in Latin America and the Caribbean. Previously, she collaborated with the Inter-American Development Bank on initiatives from the Social Protection and Health Division in Mexico and Central America. Sumiko holds a Master's in Public Policy from Harvard University and an MBA from the Barcelona Executive Business School.

  • Sung Nam Choi

    Sung Nam Choi is a professional in IT projects for development. Before joining IDB Invest, he worked as a principal manager in the National Information Society Agency (NIA) of the Republic of Korea. He led IT projects for developing countries such as national digital agenda, broadband masterplan, e-government systems & applications, and digital inclusion policy. In addition, he conducted IT advisory services and managed IT training programs collaborating with international organizations like International Telecommunication Union (ITU), Asia-Pacific Telecommunity (APT), Asian Development Bank (ADB), African Development Bank (AfDB), and Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). Furthermore, he has 7 years of field experience in Nicaragua and Costa Rica. He launched the first virtual Spanish IT education platform (CEABAD, https://ceabad.com/, located in Nicaragua) for policymakers, experts, and college students in Latin America. He coordinated over 30 MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) including digital business, e-commerce, Fintech, Internet of Things, Cloud Computing, Artificial Intelligence, and Blockchain technology through this platform. He also served as the representative of the Office of KOICA (Korea International Cooperation Agency) in Costa Rica. He studied a Ph.D. in Public Administration at Korea University, earned a master’s degree in Public Administration from Yonsei University (Korea), and completed the Executive Education Program of Digital Transformation in Government at Harvard Kennedy School (USA).

  • Susana del Granado

    Susana del Granado is an environmental and social officer at IDB Invest based Panama, responsible for evaluating environmental and social impacts and risks of loans, proposing mitigation measures consistent with international best practices, and supervising project performance. Susana holds a Ph.D. in Natural Resource Management and Environmental Policy from the State University of New York at the School of Environmental Sciences and Forestry (SUNY-ESF) in United States. She also holds a Master of Science from SUNY-ESF and a Master of Public Administration from Syracuse University at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs (United States). She has a degree in biology from the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés in Bolivia. As environmental and social coordinator at the Inter-American Corporation for Infrastructure Financing (CIFI), she has evaluated environmental and social risk in highway, hydroelectric, solar, and port projects in Latin America and the Caribbean. As a senior researcher at the think tank for Advanced Studies in Development (INESAD) she focused on research projects in environmental and ecological economics. She worked as an associate researcher at the Institute of Ecology of La Paz-Bolivia, leading research on adaptation to climate change in Aymara-peasant communities and at the School of Development Studies (CIDES) of the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, leading historical comparative studies on non-renewable resource management.

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