Our Global Presence
NIRAS and Women’s World Banking are global
The NIRAS-Women’s World Banking Consortium has a strong global presence
NIRAS has 59 Offices in 33 countries worldwide
Women’s World Banking have offices in New York, Singapore, Indonesia, and India and has regional staff in Nigeria, Kenya and Mexico
We have more than
Experts in the NIRAS CV database who work with Gender & Human Rights, Private Sector Development and Investment
Our consortium is currently implementing
Projects worldwide
of these projects relate to Gender & Human Rights, Private Sector Development, and Investments
Women’s World Banking is a part of a large global network of cross-sector partners including retail banks, microfinance institutions, fintech companies, governments, and multinational corporations, which today includes
organisations in 34 countries
with a reach of
million women
Asia and Pacific Region
The NIRAS-Women’s World Banking Consortium is well established within the Asia-Pacific region and both organisations have been implementing projects in there for more than 44 years. We have offices in Australia, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Nepal, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam. Our local presence is vital to us, as it allows us to deliver the important combination of local understanding and technical expertise to our partners and clients.
Currently, NIRAS is implementing 30 projects across the region, of which 5 relate to gender, human rights, private sector development and investment in Fiji, Pakistan, India, Indonesia Malaysia. Women’s World Banking has been implementing projects in Asia for more than 44 years and is currently implementing 26 projects across India, Indonesia, Vietnam and Cambodia.
Through the NIRAS Expert database, which contains over 50,000 experts, we have access to 7,293 experts in gender, human rights, private sector development and investment who have experience in the region.
Discover where we operate on the map below
Meet some of our
experts with experience working in the region:
Sharanda Ramanathan
Social impact measurement and poverty alleviation.
Sharada is the Southeast Asia Lead Program Manager at Women’s World Banking. She has more than 15 years of experience in the financial sector, specializing in the field of social impact measurement and poverty alleviation. Sharada leads the Monitoring and Evaluation across Indonesia, Cambodia and Vietnam for Women's World Banking. Additionally, she has strong experience in poverty measurement products and has managed strategic initiatives in the region.
David Shirley
Gender mainstreaming, gender programme design, social inclusion
David is a seasoned project director, team leader, and senior advisor with over 18 years of working experience across Asia and the Pacific. He is the Country Director of NIRAS Indonesia and has 10 years of technical expertise in gender mainstreaming, gender programme design, social inclusion, working with marginalised communities, and monitoring and evaluation. David has strong knowhow in labour policy, employment and social protection, entrepreneurship, business management and strategic planning for non-profit organisations and the private sector. Prior to his time in NIRAS, David served as Technical Advisor on a circular economy project design for ILO.
Gladys Savolainen
Developing inclusive and gender transformative approaches, and design and implementation of MEL systems to report on gender
Gladys is an international development sociologist and senior consultant at NIRAS, with extensive experience in Southeast Asia in areas related to mobilizing community participation, social assessments, social safeguards, developing inclusive and gender transformative approaches, public information and awareness, capacity building, and training. She has deep expertise in gender, equality and social inclusion, and has advised on the design and implementation of MEL systems to robustly report on gender impacts. She has developed strategies, action plans, manuals/ guidelines for integrating gender equality, women’s empowerment, conflict sensitivity, and inclusion of vulnerable groups, persons with disability, and applying human rights-based approaches.
Latin and Central America Region
Our consortium has a strong network of local consultants in Latin and Central America. Women’s World Banking's work in the Latin America region dates back to the inception of the organisation in 1979. WWB continue to partner with regulators through our Leadership & Diversity Program for Regulators, supporting them in building more inclusive policies in the region. WWB are working with retail and microfinance banks that were committed to serving low-income populations in Mexico. WWB also work with expending digital credit and addressing gender bias in lending approaches and algorithms, and e-commerce supporting MSMEs to transact digitally.
NIRAS is proud to have been implementing projects in Latin and Central America for more than 15 years. We work in a variety of areas such as management of framework contracts; finance and investments; private-sector development; monitoring, evaluation, and learning, Governance; and sustainable energy. We have an office in Bogota, Colombia, and are currently implementing 18 projects, 4 in Haiti, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay, and Peru.
Through the NIRAS expert database, we have access to 3,813 experts in gender, human rights, private sector development and investment who have experience in the region.
Discover where we operate on the map below
Meet some of our
experts with experience working in the region:
Kizzan Sammy
Training and coaching, stakeholder engagement, strategic planning, gender lens investing, and gender action planning
Kizzann is a Gender-lens investing, 2X Challenge, and Training Expert with more than 17 years of experience. She has conducted research, defined, and written reports on gender lens investment approaches for development institutions. Kizzann has also developed recommendations for women-led MSMEs as well as based on the 2X Challenge. She has designed and delivered numerous trainings, both on-site and remote, on a variety of topics including awareness and gender-lens investing. Kizzann has further been the lead technical assistant for gender topics and has knowledge of marketing and social media techniques. Additionally, she is a well-published writer on women-owned SMEs and gender-lens investing.
Marina Dimova
Solution design for women and girls, financial inclusion
Marina is the Global Head of Financial Industry & Network Advocacy at Women’s World Banking and leads the efforts to support Network Members and financial services providers across the industry to adopt best practices, share knowhow and take tangible actions to advance women’s financial inclusion. In her previous position as Managing Director of Design & Innovation, she focused on identifying and designing innovative financial solutions for women and girls. Marina is a designer with over 16 years of experience developing, implementing and scaling innovative solutions to social problems. Previously, she has also worked on agricultural value chains and private sector development at the World Bank, and in finance and healthcare consulting.
Gisela Harzon de la Roza
International gender and economic inclusion, with an emphasis on inclusive and green finance, private sector development, MSME development, and policy monitoring
Gisela is a senior international gender and economic inclusion expert, with an emphasis on inclusive and green finance, private sector development, MSME development, and policy monitoring. She has 17 years of experience in international development cooperation for programs and has been a leader in gender-focused economic development, offering expertise in project and operational management, policy development, capacity building and strategic advice across diverse regions, including Latin America and the Caribbean. Additionally, Gisela has been involved in the development of gender inclusive action plans and has knowhow in gender lens investing.
Africa and Middle East Region
The NIRAS-Women’s World Banking Consortium has a strong presence and network of partners in Africa, with NIRAS offices in Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania, Tunisia, Uganda, the United Arab Emirates, and Zambia. Since the early 1970s, NIRAS has been working with various sectors in Africa such as energy, climate change, natural resources management, governance, public sector reform, health, education, water and sanitation, agriculture, and private sector development.
Women’s World Banking has eight regional staff based in Nigeria and Kenya with 11 active projects in the region (Nigeria, Senegal and Uganda), while NIRAS is currently implementing 110 projects across Africa and the Middle East. Of these, 14 relate to relate to gender, human rights, private sector development and investment in Botswana, Kenya, Malawi, Nigeria, Tanzania, Uganda, Lebanon, Palestine, Tunisia, Turkey, Mozambique, Benin, Ghana, Burkina Faso, Zambia, and Djibouti.
Currently we have 12,452 experts in the NIRAS CV database with experience in gender, human rights, private sector development and investment in the region.
Discover where we operate on the map below.
Meet some of our
experts with experience working in the region:
Margaret Mucheru-Karuri
Financial management and credit specialist with extensive experience advising financial institutions, deep know-how of MSMEs and methods of promoting participation by women
Margaret is a seasoned financial management and credit specialist, with extensive experience with financial institutions, Commercial Banks, and multilateral investment banks, in conceptualizing, formulating and appraising donor / public sector funded financial sector development projects/programs to support the growth of the private sector so as, to promote a favorable climate for business growth critical to wealth creation, job creation, poverty alleviation, promoting participation by women and the youth, and promoting private sector development. Margaret has a banking and finance background and is, therefore, skilled in the use of different financial instruments including loans and grants. Moreover, she has hands-on experience in setting up and running a microfinance institution (The People Micro Credit and Investment Bureaux in Kenya), designing microfinance products and delivery mechanisms.
Rula Al Sadi
Gender analysis, gender mainstreaming, gender budgeting, and strategic planning
Rula is a Gender and Enterprises Development Specialist with over 20 years of experience in gender analysis, gender mainstreaming, gender budgeting, and strategic planning. She has conducted knowledge mapping and analysis of statistical data in the MENA region and has excellent knowledge of international and MENA-region agreements and initiatives on gender and development. Further, she has developed extensive knowledge and working experience on EU Gender Action Plans as well as the topics of women economic empowerment and women in the MENA region. She was the Gender & Enterprises Development Specialist for the ILO, contributing to promotion of micro-enterprises, supporting women accessing finance, and empowering women in Egypt, Sudan, Tunisia, Lebanon, and Iraq.
Kevin Kamemba
Gender lens investments
Based in Nairobi, Kevin brings 12 years of experience investing in private equity and real estate in Africa with a strong recent focus on financial inclusion. He joined WWB from Incofin Investment Management, where he served as the Regional Director for Africa and oversaw the Africa portfolio in debt and equity for financial inclusion and agro clients. Prior to his work at Incofin, he was an Investment Director with Ascent Capital, an East Africa SME-focused private equity fund and prior to that he worked at Centum Investment, the largest listed PE company in Sub-Saharan Africa. Kevin earned an undergraduate degree in Economics and has received the CPA, CFA and CAIA designations.
Europe
Due to NIRAS Scandinavian roots, our consortium has a strong anchorage in Europe. We have offices in Denmark, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Greenland, Ireland, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Serbia, Sweden, Switzerland, Ukraine and the United Kingdom where we provide our clients with services related to energy, climate change, natural resources management, governance, public sector reform, health, education, water and sanitation, agriculture, and private sector development.
A large part of Women's World Banking's Funding Partners are working out of Europe and count actors such as the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) and Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO).
NIRAS is currently implementing 84 projects across Europe. Of these, 6 relate to gender, human rights, private sector development and investment in countries such as Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ukraine, Cyprus, Albania, Turkey, North Macedonia, Serbia, Georgia, and Montenegro.
Currently we have 5,091 experts in the NIRAS CV database with experience in gender, human rights, private sector development and investment in the region.
Discover where we operate on the map below.
Meet some of our
experts with experience working in the region:
Elena Nikolova
Gender economics, entrepreneurship, economic and political development, SMEs
Elena is an expert on gender economics, entrepreneurship, economic and political development, and SMEs. She has more than 18 years of experience related to gender economics and finance, and SMEs, and has strong knowledge of the international banking and finance sector. Elena has experience in defining and piloting gender lens investing approach for financial institutions and developing a sustainable finance strategy for women SMEs, including diagnostic analysis, evaluation, analysis of new products, and preparation of related materials. Moreover, Elena has good knowledge of the 2X Challenge Initiative and has also been involved in designing solutions for gender and social exclusion, delivering technical assistance, and conducting analysis on gender gaps. She is a widely published author on gender economics and entrepreneurship, and contributed to the writing of the ERBD Gender Strategy.
Maja Bosnic
Gender-responsive budgeting and public financial management (PFM)
Maja Bosnic is Gender Expert within NIRAS, with over 20 years of professional experience in international development projects as a Gender Expert with a specialization in gender financing and gender responsive budgeting. She is an economist with deep knowledge of public investment management through work with IFIs such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank Group (WB), for whom she has developed tools to ensure that gender equity is taken up in financial management processes. She additionally develops and delivers trainings on behalf of the IMF on gender and social inclusion in finance. Maja was the Team Leader for a long-term assignment in Gender Budgeting in Ukraine funded by Sida (2013-2020). She also gave a TED talk in 2020 on how to share public money more fairly, which you can watch here.
Manuela Murthi
Monitoring and evaluation of gender equality, gender KPIs, and social inclusion
Manuela is a monitoring and evaluation specialist, with over 15 years of experience in the field. She has experience with assignments for international development corporations working with results-based management and result-oriented M&E systems. Manuela has knowhow in a variety of quantitative and qualitative research methods and analyses in the areas of social policy, gender equality and social inclusion, poverty, and others. She has also validated and updated baselines. Furthermore, she is skilled in designing and providing capacity building.