Loraine Ronchi is a Practice Manager for South Asia in the Food and Agriculture Global Practice at the World Bank Group (WBG).
Prior to joining South Asia, she led the Global Agribusiness team in the Industry Solutions group of the Finance, Competitiveness & Innovation (FCI) Global Practice. She was the WBG’s first Global Solutions Lead for Value Chains and Agribusiness, a cross-WBG role she held from 2015-2017. While Global Lead, she set up the cross-WBG Global Solutions Group (GSG) for Value chains and Agribusiness, growing to a membership of almost 300 staff cross 5 GPs and the IFC. Her focus as Global Lead was on regional cross fertilization and cross-WBG solution creation in the agribusiness space. In her 14 years at the WBG, she has led agriculture programs and policy dialogue on the agricultural sector from both headquarters and country office base in East Africa. She also served as technical lead for agribusiness private sector development in the IFC’s advisory services for three years. As such, her expertise in value chain development spans from farm to fork.
Prior to joining the WBG, Loraine worked in the coffee and cocoa sectors in research, impact evaluation, and technical assistance capacities with private sector coffee and chocolate companies. She holds an MPhil in Economics from Oxford University, and her Ph.D. in Economics is from Sussex University, U.K.