Bloggers
Edie Wilson specializes in how strategic communication and partnerships can be deployed to accelerate the speed and deepen the impact of innovation in international development. For Development Marketplace's tenth anniversary year, this means finding new ways to engage with social media, reach non-traditional audiences, create new combinations of multi-media content, and empower all the winners, finalists and participants to present their innovative solutions to a global audience. Edie understands where many of the finalists are coming from -- she grew up in a family passionate about both international development and hi-tech venture startups, and lived and traveled in Ethiopia. At age 21, she became a social entrepreneur herself, launching an advocacy NGO on food and hunger issues in the United States and raising funds for a small staff and program. Since then, she's worked in senior positions in government, the private sector and civil society. For the past ten years, she's been an advisor at the World Bank, specializing in multi-stakeholder processes. governance and anti-corruption, and economic reform. She holds a Masters in public administration from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, where she met her husband Ron Seckinger, and speaks French and more Spanish than she generally admits.
Aleem joined the World Bank Institute as Practice Manager for Innovation in November 2009. Previously, he was Head of Global Development Initiatives at Google.org and Chief Executive Officer of the Aga Khan Foundation in Syria. Aleem was trained as a social anthropologist and urban planner at Emory University and MIT. For fun, Aleem flies kites with his 3 year old, plays tennis, and finds cool apps for his iPhone.
Kirsten works with the Innovation Practice on the Development Marketplace. She has a Bachelor's of Science in Environmental Studies from The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington and Masters in Forestry from the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies. Her technical interests include community based natural resource management, eco-agriculture, agroforestry, communications and Monitoring and Evaluation. Kirsten enjoys thinking about patterns in nature and studying farming systems from around the world.
NICHOLAS VAN PRAAG manages the communications and advocacy program for the next World Development Report (WDR2011). His previous assignment was as Director of External Relations at the United Nations High Commission for Refugees where he was on external service from the Bank (2006-09). At UNHCR, he was responsible for framing the communications agenda and mobilizing financial support for the agency. He also had oversight of the agency's governance bodies and relations with a range of partners in and outside the UN system.
Van Praag began his career with the European Commission in 1977 and joined UNHCR in 1981 where he served in Geneva, Sudan, and Washington DC. He left the UN in 1986 for the Aga Khan Development Network and moved to the World Bank in 1990 where he held a number of positions including Head of External Affairs in the World Bank's European Office and Manager of External Affairs for Europe and Central Asia.
Sanjay Pradhan is Vice President of the World Bank Institute. Previously he was Director, Public Sector Governance, for the World Bank.
Faheem Noor Ali is a consultant in the Innovation Practice of the World Bank Institute. He has worked in finance, strategy and communications and supported large organizations in the public and private sectors. He has an undergraduate degree in Commerce from Queen's University in Canada and a MBA from the Kellogg School of Management (Northwestern University). Having supported two start-up companies of his own, Faheem is passionate about entrepreneurship and the human potential for change through private enterprise.
spent her early years growing up in Manila and Bangkok. She earned an MBA from University of California Berkeley Haas School of Business and an undergraduate degree in business from San Francisco State University. Before working for Wildlife Conservation Society's Cambodia Program, she provided financial services to non-profit organizations in Maine. The work in Cambodia, linking livelihoods to wildlife conservation, began with advising a local Cambodian NGO on setting up a sustainable ecotourism program. The same model is being employed with the Wildlife Friendly Ibis Rice project and the local NGO she is working with is Sansom Mlup Prey (smpcambodia.org).
With a Masters in Communication, and a specialization in film and television, Parvathi transitioned from applying pure media to designing Web-based content and cognitive eLearning solutions for large multinational organizations. Her passion for development issues, entrepreneurship and innovation helped her establish Innovation Alchemy – an innovation consulting and collaboration firm where her Team applies a broad spectrum of business, entrepreneurial and technology skills to emerging market challenges.
Ehsan Dulloo is a Senior Scientist at Bioversity International of the CGIAR. He has extensive expertise in coordinating research on the conservation of plant genetic resources, threatened species conservation and ecological restoration. Dr Dulloo currently leads Bioversity’s work on the conservation and management of agricultural biodiversity.
Maria Belenky is a Senior Program Associate at the Results for Development Institute (R4D). She has been working on the Center for Health Market Innovations (CHMI) since joining R4D in August of 2009. She is heavily involved in all aspects of the initiative, including program information collection, review and analysis. Prior to R4D, Ms. Belenky worked in institutional and program development at the Mexican Institute for Family and Population Research (IMIFAP), a Mexico City-based NGO working to spur behavior change through programs that focus on health, life skills, gender, and social participation. She holds a B.A. in International Relations and Economics from the University of Pennsylvania.
Meeting some of the “Lost Boys of Sudan” in 2005 along with co-founders of New Sudan Education Initiative (NESEI) in 2006 propelled Anita to dedicate herself to supporting education in South Sudan.
With members of the Africa ELI (formerly NESEI) team and international development colleagues, she coordinated the launch and inaugural celebration of Africa ELI’s first school in 2008. To increase the number of student beneficiaries, she negotiated Africa ELI’s first public-private partnership (PPP) agreement with Yei Girls Boarding Secondary School in 2009, effectively increasing Africa ELI’s educational outreach from the original 18 scholars to more than 1,000 students in the Yei region.
While in the US, Anita works to educate the American public about Sudan’s young people and their great leadership potential. She travels the nation to mobilize individuals and groups to invest time and resources in Africa ELI students and school projects.
A graduate of Patricia Stevens College in Missouri, with courses of continued study in Sociology at George Washington University, Anita considers her greatest classroom to be life in Sudan. Prior to her work with Africa ELI, she worked for 17 years with a faith-based institution in program development for children, youth, and adults.
Originally from central Illinois, she has lived in the Washington DC area, St. Louis, and currently has a residence in East Tennessee.
Karen works with the Innovation Practice on the Development Marketplace at the World Bank. Before joining the World Bank Karen held supervisory and policy advisory roles at diverse public institutions such as the Ministry of Infrastructure & Water and Sanitation, Congress/Parliament of the Republic, the Ministry of Health in Peru, the UN Headquarters in New York and the non-profit HAWOCODA in Africa.
She is experienced in applying different mechanisms of delivering results in partnership with key stakeholders, putting in practice her diplomatic and negotiation skills as much as anticipating and solving implementation challenges. Karen holds a Public Policy masters degree from Harvard Kennedy School of Government. She has a keen interest in moving forward strategically the organizations she has worked in, specifically if this involves finding creative solutions.
