Female candidates are turning out in numbers to learn how information and communication technologies (ICTs) can enhance their candidacies in upcoming elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
The country will be holding its presidential and parliamentary elections for the second time in its history on November 28. Women were significantly under-represented during the 2006 elections. According to the National Democratic Institute (NDI), less than 1,100 out of 9,000 candidates for parliament were women.
Mariam Diallo, the sub-Saharan Africa coordinator for iKNOW Politics, gave participants tutorials on how to use the network’s website which allows users to share information, ask questions to international experts, and take part in e-discussion on various political topics.
According to NDI, participants were also taught how to use social media and the Internet for political campaigning, to manage and plan an election campaign; and conduct political communications.
A similar campaign was conducted in Afghanistan during the 2009 provincial council elections with positive results.
Salam Watandar, Internews’ radio programming service funded by USAID, carried out an outreach campaign encouraging women to run for office after it emerged that not a single female candidate had registered for provincial council elections in eight provinces. The message to women was clear: it is your duty to run for council, Internews press release reveals.
Afghan women responded to the call. The Independent Election Commission reported that a total of 342 women had registered for 124 seats on provincial councils around the country.
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As Liberians prepare to elect a new President during the November 8 election run-off, the African Election Project (AEP) is using information and communication technologies (ICTs) to assist in monitoring the electoral process.
According to Africa News, citizens will be able to report election violence to the “Incidence Monitoring Platform”, a newly-established call center, and via SMS. Election observers and field officers are using social media tools to co-ordinate information transmission throughout the country. Moreover, cutting-edge call center software and a news database software are in place to track elections activities in real time.
“The use of ICT during this elections coverage will bring about transparency in the whole electoral process, ensure the timely release of electoral news to citizens residing in Liberia and in the Diaspora, issue alerts to the relevant institutions to prevent potential incidence of violence and to ensure credibility in the final outcome of the elections,” Mr Jerry Sam Director of AEP, said.
Established in 2008 by the Institute for ICT Journalism in strategic partnership with the Open Society Initiative, AEP aims to enable citizen and journalists to provide timely and relevant information and knowledge while undertaking monitoring specific and important aspects of governance. One of its objectives consist of providing relevant ICT tools for stakeholders involved in the electoral process.
Incumbent and recent Nobel Laureate, President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, gained the most votes but failed to pass the 50% threshold needed for outright victory in last week’s elections. Despite fraud allegations, opposition leader Winston Tubman, a former UN diplomat, has agreed to contest the run off.
BBC reports that with 96% of the vote counted, Johnson-Sirleaf has 44% against 32% for Mr Tubman, the electoral commission announced. Turnout was 71%.
Tunisians are set to vote on Sunday in first landmark elections since the Arab Spring. Google has partnered with Tunisia Live to offer training workshops on Google tools and social media for politicians to engage with voters.
Photo Credit: Tunisia Live
Tunisia Live, a startup news portal, launched Tunisia Talks on YouTube where citizens ask questions to politicians. According to Google’s official Blog, so far more than 400 questions have been submitted and over 40 members of political parties and independent coalitions have taken part in the initiative.
In the upcoming elections, Tunisians will select representatives for the new Constituent Assembly, which will ratify a new constitution and appoint a new transitional government that will schedule elections for a permanent government.
These elections are not only significant to Tunisia’s political future but their success would further advance regional democratization.
Uprisings triggered by the actions of Sidi Bouzid, a unemployed Tunisian who set himself on fire to protest against joblessness, brought an end to 23-year regime of President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in January.
Cameroon’s October 9th presidential election is fast approaching, and social media is being used to create a dialogue, raise concerns and share information about the event.
Photo credit: CNN
The country’s incumbent, Paul Biya of the Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement, has been in power for 30 years despite general dissatisfaction and outcries for the president to step down. There are currently 23 candidates in the race with John Fru Ndi of the Social Democratic Front running a distant second to Biya.
The blogging community, Global Voices, is running special coverage entitled Cameroon Elections 2011 that features blog posts from citizens around the world about the elections. The bloggers have discussed various issues surrounding the election, many accusing Biya of election corruption such as paying off politicians to falsely run against him.
CNN has reported on Biya’s “complacent attitude” since he has not been campaigning in the field. His behavior implies that Biya “plans to win through election rigging and fraud.” Youth are allegedly being paid by Biya to support the leader in the streets, and nearly all government campaigning money has been distributed to his party alone.
The Twitter community is also closely following the election, sharing articles, information, and social media tools with one another. A site that has been Tweeted frequently is one that keeps track of the election search trends. Through the tool, anyone can see which party leader or election issues are being searched the most on Google.
Cameroon Election Search Trends, from http://www.google.cm/intl/en/landing/elections/2011/
Social media has allowed those interested in Cameroon’s elections to share information in ways that were never possible before. But the country lags far behind others in the region in terms of Internet penetration rates. With only 5% of the country having Internet access, most citizens will not be able to follow the social media that is providing critical perspectives on the election. Were the majority of the country’s citizens able to follow the elections online, there might be more potential for a nation-wide movement against Biya and his alleged election rigging.
On September 15th, George Washington University’s School of Media and Public Affairs presented a guest lecture by Dr. Philip N. Howard about the role of ICTs in advancing democratization, especially in Muslim countries.
Howard, an expert scholar on the role of ICTs in political systems, based his lecture on research conducted in 75 countries in transition. The findings can be found in full in his book, The Digital Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy. An aspect of the lecture that was particularly fascinating was Howard’s “recipe” for democratic entrenchment – one that involves state capacity and a vibrant, tech-savvy wired civil society. He highlighted the ability of social media to monitor government elections.
The lecture, which emphasized the use of ICTs as a successful tool in promoting democratic societies, can be found in the video below.
So who’s next on the agenda for a revolution using Howard’s recipe? He says to think of countries that have a wired civil society + active online journalists + good state capacity; then watch those countries during the next major elections. If the heads of the countries try to rig the elections, there is a good possibility that their citizens will protest, creating chaos, uprisings, and possible transition to a new state in the same vein as Egypt. Howard lists several countries to look out for, such as Algeria, Iran and Kuwait.
Howard’s research focused primarily on Muslim countries, but one wonders if other countries might fit the recipe for civil society protests and/or revolution. Several African countries have elections coming up. Kenya, which has one of the most vibrant and open technology sectors, but a history of allegedly rigged elections, could be one to watch during the 2012 elections.
https://www.integrallc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Integra-Blue-Logo-1.png00actualizehttps://www.integrallc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Integra-Blue-Logo-1.pngactualize2011-10-05 14:13:352021-01-08 09:47:02Recipe for Democratic Entrenchment: Expert discusses the role of ICTS in advancing democratization
The World Bank approved in June a $20 million credit to support Moldova’s Governance e-Transformation (GeT) project. According to Philippe Dongier, World Bank ICT sector manager, eTransformation is “about leadership commitment for institutional reform and for citizen-centric governance.”
The project is part of a Government initiative to address Moldova’s legacy of corruption and bureaucracy inherited during the Soviet Union era by improving and modernizing public sector governance and increasing citizen access to government services.
As part of an institutional reform, the Government established in August 2010 an e-Government Center charged to develop a “digital transformation policy, a government IT strategy, and an open data roadmap”. In April, Moldova became one of the first countries in the region to launch an open data portal.
“The initiative is aimed at opening government data for citizens and improving governance and service delivery,” says Stela Mocan, executive director of the e-Government Center.
Benefits of GeT
GeT has several intended benefits that include increased transparency. The Ministry of Finance recently released a spreadsheet of more than one million lines, detailing all public spending data from the past five years.
“Publishing information about public funds will increase transparency,” says Prime Minister Vlad Filat
GeT also intends to reduce the cost of public service delivery. Through “cloud computing” infrastructure—in which applications and data are accessible from multiple network devices—the Government also expects significant savings in public sector IT expenditure.
Promoting innovation in the civil society sector is another key feature of the project. The Bank’s Civil Society Fund in Moldova—which provides grants to nongovernmental and civil society organizations—is supporting the National Environment Center in the collection and mapping of information on pollution of water resources. Since 80% of Modova’s rural population use water from nitrate-polutated wells, this initiative aims to empower citizens with the necessary tools to hold the Government accountable on the environmental policy.
E-Government: a worldwide phenomen
According to the Wolrd Bank, “e-Government” is the use by government agencies of information technologies—such as Internet, and mobile computing—that have the ability to transform relations with citizens, businesses, and other arms of government.
Moldova is not the only country using ICTs as part of an innovative approach to address corruption and strengthen democracy.
Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan of the State of Maharashtra in Western India recently launched an e-Governance program that aims to tackle corruption by reducing personal interaction between the public and government officials and requiring government officials to use computers in their day-to-day operations. Limiting discretion and facilitating the process of tracking all transactions decrease the incidence of corruption.
To combat fraudulent activities during elections, the Electoral Commission of Kenya (ECK) upgraded its computer and communication network in 2002 to verify the eligibility of voters who had lost their voting cards or whose names were missing from the manual voter registers in the respective polling stations.
ICTs’ potential for addressing governance challenges is significant. Through increased transparency and accountability, governments can better serve their citizens. Implementing successful e-Government initiatives in developing countries is a challenging endeavor. However, sustained political commitment to institutional reform, citizen-centric policies, and financial backing create an environment where ICT applications can improve governance.
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The following post is the response given to oAfrica by Francoise Stovall, Interactive Communications Manager at the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI). Guinea’s legislative elections are to be held on 11/27/2011. How can Nigeria’s experience with crowdsourcing apply to Guinea, a nation where social media is less prominent and fact often gets tangled with fiction?
In support of open & accountable democratic institutions around the globe {NDI}
Question: What’s your take on how mobile or social media can facilitate trust & communication in the upcoming #Guinea elections? Answer: NDI’s Technology team, drawing upon its regional and global experience in this realm, has the following response:
Social media provides a way for election officials to share information about what’s going on, communicate it to an engaged audience, and build public trust in the electoral process. For example, in the 2011 Nigerian elections, Nigeria’s Independent National Election Commission (INEC) did a wonderful job of communicating over twitter and other social media channels. However, it’s important to note that this type of dialogue requires proactive engagement and interest from such organizations. It provides a way to directly engage with those organizations publicly – if people see incidents or violations, they can communicate them to the authorities who can (theoretically) themselves respond. Using a collective hashtag on Twitter (if there is enough of an internal user base to make it viable) is a way for citizens to self-aggregate and share information. Eg, if the tag is #guinea11 then people can use it in their tweets to connect to all the folks communicating on the topic.
Citizen reporting can provide an avenue for people to share stories of legal violations, as mentioned above, but can also be a way to name-and-shame electoral code of conduct violations if that has been established. If there are CSOs who are attempting to collect and manage citizen reports it can be a good way to hold officials accountable for violations. There are significant challenges with such a “crowdsourcing” program, but in the right place can be a powerful methodology.
In the Guinean context, establishing public trust in the electoral process is indeed a challenge. Beyond the advantages of using social media and new technology to connect citizens to government, it’s also important to recognize the flipside of this: Social media can be the perfect way to spread pure rumor and hearsay – or worse, malicious, inflammatory information. It can prove an opportunity for the online community to work together to try to verify reports and quash misinformation. To enhance the transparency and credibility of Guinea’s upcoming legislative elections, NDI will be working with its local partner Consortium for Domestic Election Observation (CODE) to deploy citizen observers to polling sites around the country on election day to independently and systematically collect, analyze, and report information about election-day proceedings. As part of this effort, CODE and NDI, drawing on regional and international best practices, will explore ways to use social media, or to partner with organizations that are doing so, in order to better achieve its goals.
CODE used cell phone technology in its last observation effort (the country’s presidential elections of 2010) for improved reporting speed. CODE’s 2000+ citizen observers covered 20% of Guinea’s polling stations, and the coalition’s calculated election results were within 1 percent of those announced by the CENI.
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This summer I have wrote a lot about good governance programs to fight corruption, improve government effectiveness and accountability, and how they they are crucial to developing countries economic development, overall prosperity, and empowerment of civil society. One issue, however, can be the monitoring and evaluation of democracy and governance projects, which can sometimes be difficult–public opinion surveys as a form of measurement can be fraudulent, or uneven, and systems can be disorderly. Although ICTs are not a panacea for a development, they can help to streamline democratic and good governance strategies, and embolden civil society to play a participatory role. Some of the ways ICTs can be employed in democracy and governance projects, such as e-government strategies, election monitoring systems and enabling citizen media, can drastically improve the efficiency of these initiatives. Based on what I have learned so far, below are suggestions for monitoring and evaluation for an e-governance strategy, how to implement an election monitoring system from the beginning til the end, and how best to measure the effectiveness of citizen media:
1. E-government and Participation
Benefits: Transparency can be enhanced through the free sharing of government data based on open standards. Citizens are empowered to question the actions of regulators and bring up issues. The ability of e-government to handle speed and complexity can also underpin regulatory reform. E-government can add agility to public service delivery to help governments respond to an expanded set of demands even as revenues fall short.
First, on the project level, question if the inputs used for implementation and direct deliverables were actually produced. The government’s progression or regression should not rely solely on this because there are other outside variables. For the overall implementation, ask if the resources requested in place, and were the benchmarks that were set reached? Featured below is a timeline on how to implement a good e-government strategy.
Source: ITU
2. Strengthen Rule of Law with Crowdsource Election monitoring:
Benefits: Support for election monitoring may be provided prior to and/or during national or local elections and can encourage citizens to share reports from their community about voting crimes, ballot stuffing and map these crimes using Ushahidi. By documenting election crimes, it can provide evidence of corrupt practices by election officials, and empower citizens to become more engaged.
Drawbacks: Publicizing information to the broad public means without checking the information’s validity these systems can be abused in favor of one political party or the other, and elections can be highly contested.
Photo Credit: movement.org
Below are systematic instructions on how to implement the “all other stuff” needed for a election monitoring system, like Ushahidi:
Step 1. Create a timeline that includes goals you have accomplished by different marker points leading up to the election, and reaching target audiences
Step 2. The more information reports the better for the platform, but consider a primary goal and focus on filtering information about that goal to the platform, put it in the About section.
Step 3. Target your audience and know how they can be reached for example
Community partners
Crowd
Volunteers
Step 4. Figure out who your allies are—NGOs and civil society organizations that will want to support, and provide resources for more free and fair elections in your country. Figure out what groups would be best for voter education, voter registration drives, civic engagement or anti-corruption. Building a new strategy on top of the already existing ones will help to promote the campaign and making it more sustainable overtime.
Step 5.Reach out and meet with the groups you have targeted—and make sure to identify people from that country living abroad, reach out to the diaspora. Ask yourself the following questions when the program is implemented: should all reports be part of the same platform? Should reports come in before voting begins or just offenses taking place during elections? What about outreach after the election takes place for follow-up M&E?
Step 6. Get the word out to as many citizens as possible using flyers, local media, and target online influencers, such as those on Twitter or Facebook. Attract volunteers to assist in the overall outreach and publicity plan—a volunteer coordinator, technical advisor and, if possible, a verification team or local representatives, to relay and confirm what monitoring the electoral processes is all about.
Step 7. Information sources:
Mobiles: Frontline SMS can work as reception software for submissions via text.
Email/Twitter/Facebook: Consider creating a web form to link people to on social networks which asks for everything you need, including, detailed location information, category and multimedia.
Media Reports and Journalists: Have volunteers look in the news for relevant information to be included in the reports
Verification team: Either a local organization or journalist works best—on site that is able to receive alerts from the platform on events happening around their polling stations to be able to verify what is going on. Cuidemos el Voto modeled Ushahidi slightly for incoming reports from whitelisted people to show up automatically, for example non-governmental election monitoring organizations.
Step 9. Monitoring and Evaluation
Closing the loop of information: How will you show citizens who provided information on electoral fraud that you received it? Have a system in place to tell community representatives that the information was received and it will be acted upon.
How will you act on that information in the country’s courtrooms, though? Make sure to preserve the documentation of election fraud that your platform has received so that it can serve to hold the perpetrators accountable in court.
3. Citizen Media
Citizen media allows content to be produced by private citizens outside of large media conglomerates and state run media outlets to tell their stories and provide bottom up information. Also known as citizen journalism, participatory media, and democratic media, citizen media is burgeoning with all of the technological tools and systems available that simplify the production and distribution of media
Benefits: In addition to the above-mentioned benefits, citizen media also allows a sense of community where up-to date news covers a variety of angles, stories, and topics found in hard to reach places.
Drawbacks: It can be risky for the citizens journalists and their supporters. They can be identified and targeted by members of the oppression, where they will be put in jail or tortured. There is no gatekeeping, verifying, or regulating the information—this is not a problem when it comes to video or photos, but definitely with information. Also, connectivity issues may not allow citizens to upload the information.
Helpful Resources: This journalist’s toolkit is a training site for multimedia and online journalists.
Monitoring and Evaluation for citizen media projects: Governments have foreign policy and economic agendas that guide their choices on how they fund projects, therefore, it’s important that the grantees and activists understand and share the same objectives. This is also beneficial to learn from projects over time to avoid redundancy and enhance efficiency of implementation.
Measurement approaches—Some corporate funding agencies like the Gates Foundation, Skoll Foundation, and Omidyar Network insist on measuring citizen media projects, while other funding agencies like the Knight Foundation insist less on measurement. It’s important to measure both quantitative and qualitative outcomes and give constructive feedback to the contributors so that they can become more effective.
Quantitative—Objectives may sometimes change in response to your context, but keep the end goal in mind, continue to measure yourself against the objectives. This can be done through web analytics or web metrics—website performance monitoring service to understand and optimize website usage
Qualitative—Primarily anecdotal and used to shift policy objectives. In the end, however, it’s about visualizing the change you are trying to bring in the world, and making it happen.
Current discourse on the Arab Spring excludes social media as the sole perpetuator of the movement—but scholars and activists alike, agree that technology has helped to unify and project, citizen’s feeling of dissent.
My previous post about last Wednesday’s Future Tense event explored some speaker’s discussion on the West’s connection with new technologies, as either aiding or embedding the revolution.
Other panelists, however, elicited a more homegrown, internal perception on how the uprisings evolved.
Merlyna Lim, Professor of at the Consortium of Science, Policy and Outcomes and the School of Social Transformation – Justice and Social Inquiry Program at Arizona State University, discussed origins of anti-Mubarak protests in Egypt.
She claimed it was rooted before the Tahir moment occurred, stemming from three stages of organization—networks, narratives and claim making—to mobilize collective action.
The first protest organized exclusively online, without physical headquarters, was arranged by Kefaya in 2004. Using a website calledMisr Digital, Lim recalls, the organizers increased the reach of the oppositions movement through the websites by engaging weak ties.
After the death of Khaled Said on June 6, 2010, the participatory youth culture, added emotions onto their organizational network’s narrative—and Egyptians feared being killed.
Khaled Said’s passing changed Egyptian’s view on human rights violations, the panelist stated. While it was once an abstract narrative, they are now saw concrete infringements by the regime—such as corruption, torture, and eventual death.
Egyptians shared these contentions, spreading them by networks. “The Tahir moment was facilitated by cabs, signs, cell phones, word of mouth, SMS, and social media provided the organizing platform,” Lim alluded.
Ahmed Al Omran & Oula Alrifai Photo Credit: New America Foundation
Another panel convened by Oula Alrifai and Ahmed al-Omran discussed their firsthand perspectives on the violence in Syria, and the political and social issues of Saudi Arabia.
Alrifai, a Syrian youth activist discussed the origins of the Syrian protests. With no independent media and post-imprisonment of an Al Jazeera correspondent, she stated, social media and video were the only ways to get information about the revolutions to the outside work.
However, the connections to do so were not always available.
For activists, using cell phones with cameras was the easiest way to take pictures and record videos, but since they had no networks in the ground someimtes they had to cross the borders. Some activists, “were crossing the borders to go to Jordan to download the videos in Internet cafés and (would) come back and fight again or be on the street and protest, risking their lives,” Alrifai said.
Ahmed al-Omran, a blogger for his site saudijeans.org, discussed the excitement many have felt across the Gulf of the revolutions.
Though the demand for freedom and justice in his home country of Saudi Arabia is similar, the dynamic is different—elections do not exist, and Saudis are largely politically unaware because citizens are not allowed to, “practice politics”.
Ahmed only became aware of politics when he started blogging in 2004, as he was not raised discussing the government, but social media gave him an outlet to learn about them. “I think that the Internet and social media has given this generation a space where they can express themselves and engage with one another and talk about the issues that are typically hard to talk about in the public sphere,” he said.
Ahmed also stated that an uprising similar to Egypt will be difficult in Saudi Arabia because of the monarchy, but predicts it will occur because time is on the people’s side. “Money is a short term resolution, these issues need a fundamental solution,” Ahmed poignantly observed, “At some point the money will run out, the oil revenues will not be there forever”.
Though opinions vary on how imperative social media was to aiding the Arab Spring uprisings, almost all scholars and activists agree—it is an organizational tool that can bring like-minded individuals to collaborate for change.
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The President of Kenya, Mwai Kibaki, watches a demonstration Photo Credit: Ushahidi
Last Friday, Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki inaugurated the Kenya Open Data Initiative (KODI), an online resource to catalog and display the government’s expenditures—launching the ICT pioneering country into a new epoch of transparency and accountability.
The new initiative is a crucial step for Kenyan citizens to monitor public spending amid previous corrupt practices, including the alleged manipulation of the 2007 elections.
The KODI contains 160 datasets arranged by country-level and county, and is organized within various sectors, including: education, energy, health, population, poverty, along with water and sanitation. Information for the datasets were taken from national census, government ministries, and information from the World Bank.
Prior to creating this information platform, the Kenyan government seldom made statistics and information on these sectors publicly available, or would postpone their release.
Now, however, they are taking a participatory approach to following the new 2010 Kenyan Constitution requiring the government to make information on the country publicly accessible.
On its homepage, the KODI website asserts the new transformation taking place:
Our information is a national asset, and it’s time it was shared: this data is key to improving transparency; unlocking social and economic value; and building Government 2.0 in Kenya
The platform allows citizens to actively engage on the information they want, and need to know.
Users of the open data portal can create interactive charts and tables, and developers can download the raw data to build applications for web and mobile. Additionally, users can press a “suggest a dataset” icon, which aggregates the requests for new information and sorts them according to relevance.
According to the Guardian, Kenyans have already made mass requests for data on youth unemployment, libraries, crime, and the locations of primary and secondary schools.
In addition to managing the data, the Kenya ICT Board plans to award groups and individuals who configure the data advantageously, intending to give out up to thirty grants to those with the best ideas.
A series of valuable initiatives have already been taking place.
Huduma (Kiswahili for “service”), derived from Ushaidi, has already started to use statistics collected on health, infrastructure, and education to compare the provision of aid across different districts of Kenya. Business Daily, a Nairobi-based news service, had announced plans to publish a series of articles on the newly released applications and services. Virtual Kenya built an application mapping counties where Members of Parliament declined to pay taxes.
Screenshot of Ushahidi's Huduma
Kenyan entrepreneurs are now in charge of publicizing this information and making it user-friendly.
Though the Kenyan government has been lambasted for a lack of transparency and accountability in the past, this open source data program allows Kenyan citizens to recognize development challenges and foster their own solutions—leading themselves and their county into a new era of progressive growth.
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Summer Hunter-Kysor currently serves as Senior Project Associate for Integra’s EE/MELDS and AEO contracts with USAID. With five years of development experience and a strong background in peacebuilding, governance, and education, she has spearheaded impactful projects with the goal of improving the lives of individuals and communities worldwide. Armed with an MA in International Development and BA in International Relations, Ms. Hunter-Kysor possesses a deep understanding and curiosity of the everchanging complexities facing developing regions and has successfully supported the implementation of notable initiatives that drive positive social impact and sustainable change.
Prior to joining Integra, Ms. Hunter-Kysor worked at Creative Associates International, where she provided backstop support to three USAID- and USAID/OTI-funded projects with values between $3-$38 million. She managed several aspects of project efforts including technical, financial, contractual, reporting & communications, HR, and operational duties. She led her teams’ knowledge management efforts to ensure that project successes and lessons learned could be adjusted and applied in different contexts. She was further dedicated to business development efforts in the democracy and governance space, serving as a contributing author on a solicitation the company won valued at $24 million. Previously, she focused on monitoring, evaluation, and learning and process improvement through her work in Pittsburgh local government and community development-focused nonprofits. Ms. Hunter-Kysor’s experience also includes federal contracting, a graduate internship with the Department of State (DoS), data research for the UNDP, and teaching English as a second language through the DoS Fulbright program.
As a compassionate leader, Ms. Hunter-Kysor is driven by a commitment to empower marginalized communities, advocate for social justice, and promote equitable access to essential services through locally led and inclusive approaches.
Gevorg Torosyan
Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (MEL) Director
Mr. Torosyan leads one of the firm’s practice areas as the Director of Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning. He brings 18 years of experience in USAID and other donor-funded project management, evaluation, and consulting roles in more than 15 countries across Europe, Asia, and Africa. Half of his career was dedicated to delivering development consulting assignments in field offices as Project Director, Team Leader, and Policy Advisor in projects funded by USAID, The World Bank, ADB, UNDP, and EU. The remaining half was devoted to managing USAID-funded projects from the corporate headquarters of development consulting firms in the Washington, D.C. area.
Mr. Torosyan’s technical expertise spans a wide range of private sector development topics, such as the improved enabling environment for trade and investment, firm-level competitiveness enhancement, value chain development, and increasing SME access to finance. He also has in-depth knowledge of public sector governance reform issues, including evidence-based decision-making practices, impact assessment schemes, regulatory convergence with international standards, reform of state-owned enterprises in the energy and other infrastructural sectors, anti-corruption, and improved public service delivery via Govtech solutions.
Beyond his extensive project management and advisory work, Mr. Torosyan has a decade of experience in project performance evaluation and monitoring. He has demonstrated his expertise in Monitoring and Evaluation Lead roles at a development consulting firm in Washington, DC, and as an independent Evaluation Team Leader and Principal Evaluator of multiple donor-funded projects in Europe and Asia.
Mr. Torosyan holds a Master of Advanced Studies degree in International Law and Economics from the University of Bern, World Trade Institute, Switzerland. He was also a research fellow at the University of Muenster, Germany, specializing in institutional economics, which led to a Doctor of Economics degree from the Institute of Economic Research. He speaks Armenian and Russian fluently.
Brenda Lee Pearson
Research Director, LEAP III
Ms. Brenda Lee Pearson is the Research Director for the Integra-managed USAID Learning, Evaluation, and Analysis Project (LEAP III) and has served as Team Leader for economic growth performance evaluations in Georgia, Kenya, Ukraine, and USAID’s global programs: CATALYZE, EDGE, US-SEGA, Women’s Economic Empowerment Fund. She served as the gender and social inclusion advisor to USAID/India and Indo-Pacific Strategy from 2020-21. She has been Team Leader for democracy, human rights and governance assessments and political economy analyses in Bosnia Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Guyana, Honduras, Kosovo, Malawi, Romania and Tanzania. She served as global coordinator of nutrition programming for the United Nations World Food Programme, FAO, UNICEF and WHO. Ms. Pearson has provided technical assistance to projects funded by USAID, State Department, Millennium Challenge Corporation, DfID, AustraliaAid, World Bank, and UN agencies in 50 countries, and authored more than 100 articles. Ms. Pearson is the President of Cui Prodest, LLC, a woman-owned small business (www.cuiprodest.org) that partners frequently with Integra. Earlier in her career, she served as Chief of Party in Cambodia, Croatia, Egypt, N. Macedonia, Tanzania and Yemen.
Peter Levine
Business Development and Private Sector Specialist
Mr. Levine is a senior new business, project management and private sector development specialist with over 20 years direct experience in the design, oversight and implementation of complex international technical assistance programs, including extensive work in Latin America, Eastern Europe, Asia and Africa. He is well versed in private sector development, agriculture, land use planning and international best business practices, with a strong track record for facilitating stakeholder relationships for tangible and practical results. He has a proven track record for impact with USAID, MCC, DFID and other donors, working as both a Team Leader, Chief of Party, or key member of a multi-disciplinary team on both innovative projects and winning proposals. Prior experience as Executive or Practice Area lead who helped grow technical, financial and human capital for firms/clients, including leadership of USAID projects valued at between US$25 – $75 million.
Elizabeth Ferris
Migration Expert and Advisor
Elizabeth Ferris is Research Professor with the Institute for the Study of International Migration at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service and an adjunct professor in the Georgetown Law School. From January-September 2016, she served as Senior Advisor to the UN General Assembly’s Summit for Refugees and Migrants in New York. She presently serves as an expert advisor to the UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Panel on Internal Displacement.
From 2006-2015, she was a Senior Fellow and co-director of the Brookings-LSE Project on Internal Displacement where she worked to support understanding and protection of internally displaced persons. Prior to joining Brookings, she spent 20 years working in the field of humanitarian assistance, most recently in Geneva, Switzerland at the World Council of Churches. She has also served as the director of the Church World Service’s Immigration and Refugee Program, as research director for the Life & Peace Institute in Uppsala, Sweden and as a Fulbright professor at the Universidad Autónoma de México. Her teaching experience has included positions at Lafayette College, Miami University and Pembroke State University. She has written extensively on refugee, migration and humanitarian issues, including The Politics of Protection: The Limits of Humanitarian Action (Brookings Institution Press, 2011), Consequences of Chaos: Syria’s Humanitarian Crisis and the Failure to Protect, with Kemal Kirsici (Brookings Institution Press, 2016). Her latest book, Refugees, Migration and Global Governance: Negotiating the Global Compacts, with Katharine Donato, was published by Routledge in 2019. She received her BA degree from Duke University and her MA and PhD degrees from the University of Florida.
Quang Phan
Vietnam Country Director
Quang Phan has a 20-year track record of performance in running some of the most impactful projects in Vietnam and in the Mekong Region. These projects range from innovation and technology, sustainable public private policy dialogue and regulatory reform, and trade and investment facilitation. As an out of the box thinker, Quang has good judgement and a good sense of humour. He knows how to turn vision into ideas, and ideas into actions and results. He builds high performing teams and networks.
Quang has served as Integra’s Country Director in Vietnam since 2018 and leads the development and implementation of the USAID funded project in reforming PPP regulations and practices in Vietnam. Working with the home office and USAID/Vietnam, Quang has mobilized a team of international and local experts to work with the Ministry of Planning and Investment, the National Assembly, the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the business community on developing the first PPP Law of Vietnam. The team has built the capacity of a public private partnership committee that advocates for good PPP regulations and practices in Vietnam and piloted a PPP pipeline development tool in two provinces.
Theresa Miles Director, Business Operations
Ms. Theresa Miles is Integra’s Director of Business Operations and leads contract administrative management and oversees project operations and financial management. She guides the development of effective project operations and financial standards and operationalizing structures for delivery, risk management, reporting, and forecasting. She is also serving as the Operations Manager for the Integra-managed USAID Learning, Evaluation, and Analysis project (LEAP III), a five-year project that supports USAID globally by providing independent high-quality analytical services; strategy and project design; monitoring and evaluation; training; and knowledge management.
Theresa has 25 years of experience in international development and project management in Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, and South Asia. She has split her career between home office project support and management roles and overseas roles. She excels at organizing and increasing efficiencies by examining operations, analyzing needs, identifying duplication of effort and tailoring policies and procedures to project, organization, and donor requirements.
She has long-term experience in Ghana, Uganda, Madagascar, India, Democratic Republic of Congo and short-term experience in Mexico, Egypt, Mongolia and Tanzania. Theresa holds an MA in International Policy from the Monterey Institute of International Studies and has a general understanding of Spanish and working knowledge of French. Outside of work, she enjoys spending time with her dogs, antiquing, and refurbishing old furniture.
Theresa Miles
Director, Business Operations
Ms. Theresa Miles is Integra’s Director of Business Operations and leads contract administrative management and oversees project operations and financial management. She guides the development of effective project operations and financial standards and operationalizing structures for delivery, risk management, reporting, and forecasting. She is also serving as the Operations Manager for the Integra-managed USAID Learning, Evaluation, and Analysis project (LEAP III), a five-year project that supports USAID globally by providing independent high-quality analytical services; strategy and project design; monitoring and evaluation; training; and knowledge management.
Theresa has 25 years of experience in international development and project management in Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, and South Asia. She has split her career between home office project support and management roles and overseas roles. She excels at organizing and increasing efficiencies by examining operations, analyzing needs, identifying duplication of effort and tailoring policies and procedures to project, organization, and donor requirements.
She has long-term experience in Ghana, Uganda, Madagascar, India, Democratic Republic of Congo and short-term experience in Mexico, Egypt, Mongolia and Tanzania. Theresa holds an MA in International Policy from the Monterey Institute of International Studies and has a general understanding of Spanish and working knowledge of French. Outside of work, she enjoys spending time with her dogs, antiquing, and refurbishing old furniture.
Penelope Norton
Associate
Penelope is an Associate at Integra, where she supports a variety of USAID and MCC-funded projects. She has more than five years of experience in operations and project management and provides backstopping support on activities. Responsibilities include managing activity budgets, providing logistical support, recruiting, contracts, and travel preparations. Other experience includes data collection, program evaluation, quality assurance, and two years of program implementation in Guatemala.
Penelope holds an MS in Conflict Analysis and Resolution from George Mason University with a concentration in Prevention, Reconstruction and Stabilization, and a BA in International Affairs from James Madison University. When not working, Penelope enjoys international travel or camping in the amazing US National Parks.
Kethi Mullei
Learning and Evaluation Director
Kethi Mullei is a social researcher and qualitative analyst with over 15 years of experience working in development in Sub-Saharan Africa, primarily East Africa. Her most recent long-term position was with the BMGF CIFF & Hewlett – funded program, HCDExchange, serving as the Learning Lead. She recently joined Integra as Learning and Evaluation Director to support the USAID/Kenya & East Africa Mission.
Kethi is a passionate learner and researcher with a background in global public health and a keen interest in generating evidence on the value of applying simple, replicable yet rigorous human-centered and action-oriented methodologies for optimal application in improving the quality of global health interventions and outcomes in the Global South. She brings a great wealth of experience in health policy analysis & development, protocol & product development (learning agendas, practical guidance), literature/ desk reviews, knowledge management, and application of participatory and one-to-one learning methods in practice (e.g., capturing success stories, appreciative inquiry (AI), outcome harvesting). Having worked for 15 years collaborating with various stakeholders—civil society, research institutions, private sector, and funders/donors—she is an eager contributor to the broad field of global health.
Sarah Eissler
Evaluation Specialist
Sarah is an evaluation specialist with broad international experience designing, implementing, and analyzing mixed-methods research and evaluation projects addressing issues in agriculture, food security and nutrition, climate change, women’s empowerment, and the environment. Sarah currently works as an independent consultant to lead and support mixed-method evaluations for USAID, UN Agencies, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, among others. She has supported several Integra activities under the LEAP III project as a data analytics and research design specialist with specific attention to the design and analysis of qualitative data. Recently, she has supported a strategic review of USAID’s Partnering to Accelerate Entrepreneurship (PACE) Initiative, a portfolio performance evaluation of the former USAID Women’s Global Development and Prosperity (W-GDP) Initiative, a strategic review of USAID’s Development Innovation Ventures (DIV) program, and evaluations and assessments in Egypt and Ukraine. She has a dual Ph.D. in Rural Sociology and Human Dimensions of Natural Resources and the Environment, and dual M.S. degrees in Rural Sociology and International Agriculture and Development from Penn State University.
Meziane Menasria
Associate
Meziane is an Associate at Integra, where he supports the MCC-funded Togo project and several other USAID projects. He brings more than seven years of experience working for a global K-12 education non-profit organization where he contributed project management, business intelligence, team management, budget tracking, and recruiting. He is a fluent French speaker and conversational in Spanish and Polish. He holds a BA in Government & Politics from the University of Maryland, College Park. In his free time, he enjoys watching club and international football (soccer) and hiking in the great outdoors.
Julienne Kaman
Technical Advisor – Papua New Guinea
Julienne Kaman serves as the Technical Advisor in Papua New Guinea (PNG) under USAID’s Asia Emerging Opportunities mechanism. Ms. Kaman has spent more than 30 years in the teaching profession, researching and doing consultancies in several PNG universities. She has taken short-term consultancies with the PNG Government and Governments of other Pacific Island countries, namely the Republic of Nauru. Ms. Kaman has also worked with international organizations such as UNICEF, UNDP, UNESCO, and the Incentive Fund Program of the Australian Government and with international nongovernment organizations in the country, namely, Save the Children Fund and Asia Pacific Bureau of Adult Education (ASPBAE) and with local companies such as Tanorama. As a certified and experienced teacher in PNG, Ms. Kaman has also written several contextualized textbooks in the Social Sciences for teachers and students to use at all levels of education in PNG.
Mrs. Hoang Anh
Business Environment Sustainability and Transformation (BEST) Director – Vietnam
Mrs. Hoang Anh Do serves as the Business Environment Sustainability and Transformation (BEST) Director in Vietnam under USAID’s Asia Emerging Opportunities mechanism. Before joining Integra, Mrs. Anh Do had experience holding several positions in the developing world and private sector. She served as Deputy Project Director of USAID/Vietnam Competitiveness Initiative (VNCI), leading three impactful initiatives, including 1) Administrative Procedures Reform of the Government of Vietnam (known as Project 30) by the Office of the Government, 2) Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA) for Ministry of Justice and other stakeholders, 3) Public Private Partnership under Ministry of Planning and Investment, and 4) Provincial Competitiveness Index (PCI) with Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI).
She also worked on legal and economic reform in the USAID/Sustaining Technical and Analytical Resources (STAR) project, which helped the State Bank of Vietnam, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Planning and Investment, the Ministry of Industry and Trade, the Ministry of Post and Telematics, the State Audit, different committees of the National Assembly to overwrite Vietnamese legal framework to implement Vietnam commitments under the US-Vietnam Bilateral Trade Agreement.
In the private sector, she established and chaired health tech, agri-tech, and logistics companies. Her vast experience and network in Government and private sector are valuable for her work to accelerate the transformation of Vietnam’s business environment and sustainability.
Brenna Casey
Program and Business Development Manager
Brenna is a Program and Business Development Manager at Integra. She brings five years of experience in various project management and technical capacities across the USAID and MCC portfolios. Programmatic responsibilities include leading and providing task order oversight and support on contracts, recruitment, budgets, client and subcontractor relations, reporting, and quality assurance. Business development roles include strategic planning and pipeline development, market research, partner and proposal coordination, staffing, technical writing, and compliance. Technical capabilities include research and data analysis, including sectoral, political economy, and landscape assessments; performance evaluations; and trainings, workshops, and knowledge management engagements.
Brenna has managed several activities under Asia Emerging Opportunities (AEO) and the Learning, Evaluation, and Analysis Project (LEAP III), including the USAID/Middle East Bureau’s multi-year $1.7+ million buy-in for private sector engagement (PSE). This activity supported the co-creation and implementation of PSE Action Plans for the Bureau and Operating Units in the region, including Bureau and Mission learning events, remote and in-person private sector outreach, Private Sector Landscape Assessments (PSLAs), and a report on PSE opportunities coming from the Gulf region. She supports the kickoff of the USAID Europe and Eurasia Monitoring, Evaluation, Learning, and Decision Support (EE/MELDS) and MCC Economic Analysis BPA contracts.
Ms. Casey holds a MA in Political Economy from Georgetown University and a BA in Foreign Affairs from the University of Virginia. She earned an advanced certificate in Political Economy from the ULB Solvay School of Economics and Management in Brussels, Belgium, and a project management certification from the University of Virginia. She is also certified in project management by the Project Management Institute (PMI). Additional professional experience includes a graduate internship with the Development Finance Corporation and health policy consulting in Alexandria, Virginia.
Eleanor Roberts
Associate
Eleanor is an Associate at Integra, supporting the USAID-funded Asia Emerging Opportunities task order. She assists in managing and backstopping projects, including planning, organizing, coordinating, program execution, and monitoring. Responsibilities include project reporting, budget tracking, and analysis, research and data analysis, assisting with project recruitment, ensuring contractual compliance, and providing administrative support as needed. Additionally, Eleanor assists in developing communications materials for the firm, including authoring content for Integra’s website.
Before Integra, Eleanor worked at Meridian International Center as a Program Associate implementing the International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP) — the U.S. Department of State’s premier professional exchange. She holds a B.A. in Political Science and History from Denison University in Granville, Ohio.
Kate Fehlenberg
Director of Scaling Innovations
Kate Fehlenberg is an international development professional with over 20 years of experience across a dozen countries. She has designed, managed, scaled, and evaluated small and multi-million dollar programs in Public Health, Agriculture and Gender. With deep experience in coalition building, systematic assessments of new technologies, and strengthening local systems, Kate is uniquely skilled in Scaling sustainable solutions. Kate has worked for NGOs, researchers, and donors at headquarters and the field in over a dozen countries across Asia and Africa; sat on donor and fundraising committees; run hundreds of workshops, and trained and led teams in numerous countries. In her last overseas assignment (2015-2019), Kate managed a $15M USAID food security project across six countries in Africa. She established the SeedAssure Alliance, a public-private coalition to digitize commercial value chains in Africa to improve Ag technologies accessible to millions of farmers. She currently works with Integra as Director of Scaling Innovations, leading assessments of development investments for their market impact and sustainability potential. Kate has an MPH in Population in Family Health and Complex Emergencies from Columbia University, a Master’s in Civil Engineering from Ga Tech, and a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Science from Samford University.
Paul Dodds
Enabling Environment Expert
Paul Dodds has a JD and over 25 years of experience in development consulting with MCC, USAID, DFID, the World Bank, AUS DFAT and ADB in over 15 countries. He has extensive expertise in legal analysis, policy reform and commercial due diligence, and experience working in AgCLIR analyses in varying capacities, with specific engagements for MCC in Tunisia, Philippines and Benin. In his AgCLIR work for USAID in Liberia, he focused on exploring the possible impacts of regulations restricting access to fresh markets for smallholder farmers and women traders.
Most recently, Paul brought technical expertise to the Integra team working in Bangladesh helping to design a support program for food safety and nutrition, and also on a detailed review of the new Vietnamese public private partnership law, providing background information to encourage the donor support needed for the law to succeed.
Paul studied Economics at Columbia and graduated from Harvard Law School. He spent the first decade of his professional career as a corporate lawyer and general counsel in Boston. He is now based in Little Rock, Arkansas where he owns and manages a growing portfolio of investments in renovated historic homes as his primary occupation. He speaks fluent German, serviceable French, Spanish and Russian and some Khmer.
Cynthia Mallory
Controller, Business Operations
Ms. Mallory has spent 20 years working with international development consulting firms. She currently serves as Integra’s Controller, and also manages Business Operations for the firm. She is an award-winning United State Air Force retiree who worked in forward locations during Operation Desert Storm and Desert Shield. She provided aid to supply officers, transportation commanders, fighter pilots and many more.
Liesl Kim
Operations Specialist
Liesl has been an Associate at Integra for nearly two years, providing project management and operations support for USAID-funded projects. She serves as the lead Associate on the Learning, Evaluation, and Analysis (LEAP III) Project, spearheading reporting mechanisms. She manages many aspects from activity start up to close, including drafting concept notes and work plans; recruiting and managing consultants; tracking budgets; organizing field work logistics; reporting on findings; and designing infographics/presentations to disseminate lessons learned. Liesl also provides support to the Asia Emerging Opportunities (AEO) Project and has worked on more than 30 unique activities, serving as the Operations Lead on 16 activities to date. She has also contributed to performance evaluations, such as the evaluations of the USAID/OFDA LAC Regional Disaster Assistance Program and the Power Africa Transactions and Reforms Program. Prior to joining Integra, she interned at the Asian Development Bank North American Representative Office, assisting in outreach efforts with stakeholders and partner organizations.
She holds an MA in International Development Studies from the Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University and a BA in Political Science and International Studies from Pepperdine University. She is a 5th degree black belt in Taekwondo and attributes the global sport as first attracting her to the realm of international relations.
Kaitlyn Turner
Data Analytics Manager
Kaitlyn leads Integra’s quantitative analysis and data collection work as the Data Analytics Manager. Prior to joining the Integra team in 2020, she worked in both project management, and programming and analysis of impact evaluations for a number of research-focused non-profit organizations. She has experience designing evaluation plans, managing quantitative data collection work, performing data analysis using Stata, and developing reports and other dissemination tools for internal and external stakeholders. She has spent the last three years living in Nairobi, Kenya and working throughout East Africa. She has worked in many sectors including global health, agriculture, and digital financial inclusion.
Ruta Aidis
Gender and Economic Development Advisor
Dr. Ruta Aidis is a leading expert in gender and economic development. She has more than 25 years of experience teaching, researching, consulting and publishing in the area of gender, women’s economic empowerment, entrepreneurship, innovation, institutional development and public policy. She is an award-winning author with over 50 published articles, books and reports. Dr. Aidis has conducted multiple gender-related assessments and consultancies for USAID and other international donor agencies. In 2019, she led USAID’s first global gender analysis of the recycling and waste management sector piloting both the Women’s Economic Empowerment and Equality (WE3) toolkit and recommendations for Women’s Global Development and Prosperity (W-GDP) initiatives.
As part of the LEAP III program, Dr. Aidis is serving as the deputy team lead for USAID’s portfolio performance evaluation (PPE) of the Women’s Global Development and Prosperity (W-GDP) initiative’s Round 1 funded activities. Previously she acted as the team lead for the 2020 Strategic Review of USAID’s Partnering to Accelerate Entrepreneurship (PACE) initiative.
Dr. Aidis is also a Senior Fellow at the Schar School for Policy and Government, George Mason University and founder of ACG Inc. She holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Amsterdam, an MA in International Development from the Institute for Social Studies and a BA from the University of Maryland.
Tim Schur
Chief Executive Officer
Timothy Schur is leading the company into the future by building on a foundation laid by Bob Otto, the founder of the firm in 2010. With more than 30 years of experience in advisory and consulting services, Timothy has filled wide-ranging roles in corporate finance, strategy and innovation, impact investment, business development, and business practice leadership. For the last decade he has been supporting International Development programs and investments for the United States, United Kingdom, and Australian governments as well as direct investments by governments across the Middle East, Africa and Asia. Throughout his career, Timothy has been a champion for performance-based contracting, impact investment and capital mobilization, systems enablement and knowledge sharing through technology, and program designs that result in durable solutions for economic independence.
Leading Integra is a return to the small business roots of Timothy’s career where client centric, nimble business solutions deliver impact for the investment stakeholders, beneficiaries and the individuals applying their expertise and experience to delivery. From a vantage point versed in traditional international development investors, cognizant of the capital constraints, and grounded in results measurement as the key to enduring impact; Timothy is positioning Integra as a key resource for government, private sector, and NGO clients seeking to capture and enhance both the financial and social return on their investments into emerging economies.
Robert Otto
Founder
Mr. Otto has more than 25 years of experience in international development and project management. He is highly experienced in providing consulting services and managing complex projects in private sector development, economic restructuring, and institutional development. Earlier in his career, Mr. Otto served as Chief Private Sector Officer, Financial Analyst, Project Development Officer, and Chief Environment Officer for the US Agency for International Development. Mr. Otto holds a MS in Management from MIT and a MS in Technology of Management from American University.
David Quinn
Chief Technical Officer
Mr. David Quinn is Integra’s Chief Technical Officer, where he oversees all company projects and activities. He has 15 years of experience working in international development projects and specializes in managing multiple-country, multiple-activity, mechanisms.
Currently, he serves as the Chief of Party for the Integra-managed USAID Learning, Evaluation and Analysis project (LEAP III), a five-year project that supports USAID globally by providing independent high-quality analytical services; strategy and project design; monitoring and evaluation; training; and knowledge management.
Mr. Quinn has conducted over 80 assignments across 23 countries. His technical expertise includes economic growth, policy and enabling environment reform, private sector engagement (PSE), and public-private partnerships (PPPs). In addition to his passion for international development (and Integra), he is an avid Liverpool Football Club fan.
Deanna Gordon
Director, Development Analytics
Dr. Gordon is Director of Development Analytics, as well as Chief of Party for the Asia Emerging Opportunities mechanism at Integra. She is an Agricultural Economist with a long track record in international development. Prior to joining the Integra team, she was with USAID as a Foreign Service Officer from 2005-2019. Her expertise is rooted in monitoring and evaluation, quantitative and mixed methods analysis, and impact evaluation. She has served in a variety of positions at USAID, including as Senior Agriculture and Food Security Advisor for USAID/BFS, Senior Monitoring and Evaluation Advisor at USAID/FFP, and Office Director for the Office of Economic Growth at USAID/DRC. She speaks French, Spanish, and Portuguese with professional proficiency and holds a Ph.D. in Agricultural and Resource Economics from UC Berkeley.
Kent Ford
Director, Private Sector Engagement (PSE)
Kent Ford is a pioneering international development professional with over 25 years of experience in successfully leading and delivering a range of private sector-focused programs in emerging and developing markets. Under the Learning, Evaluation and Analysis Project III (LEAP III), Kent leads Integra’s Middle East Private Sector Engagement Activity supporting the adoption of USAID’s Private Sector Engagement (PSE) Policy in the USAID/Middle East Bureau and associated Missions. This includes inter alia, writing a Strategic Vision for the Middle East Bureau, leading the development of a ThinkPiece envisioning the future of PSE in the MENA region, developing and leading monthly training webinars widely broadcasted throughout MENA and USAID/Washington, and creating an actionable approach to engaging the private sector in the work of USAID.
Kent has broad and proven strategic management and leadership experience as well as economic, political and cultural understanding from having worked in nearly 60 countries. Mr. Ford is a two-time entrepreneur, most recently as co-founder and Managing Director of Global Development Solutions, where he directed the establishment, growth and leadership of a global network of staff and consultants spanning four continents.
Kent co-developed the integrated value chain and market analysis methodology used by the World Bank, Asian Development Bank and sovereign governments to rigorously analyze agriculture and non-agriculture value chains to determine areas where foreign and domestic investment, access to finance and technical intervention would enhance the competitive position of entire market systems. He designed and spearheaded regional Trade and Investment initiatives by bringing together governments, private sector actors, NGOs, municipalities and development agencies—an innovative approach designed help businesses access new markets leading to millions of dollars in trade, investment, and market linkages. He has spent a total of eight years living in, working on and leading in-country private sector development project teams in the West Bank/Gaza, Albania, Kosovo, Nigeria and Uganda.
David Townsend
ICT Sector Advisor
Mr. Townsend is an international expert in ICT policy and economics and the leader of GBI’s Universal Service and Access Fund Support Program. For more than 25 years, Mr. Townsend has been a leading contributor to the evolution of the communications sector worldwide, and has advised governments in more than 40 countries on economic issues and policy options for ICTs. He has been one of the pioneers in the design of Universal Service Funds in numerous countries, and has worked extensively with the World Bank and the UN, among others.
Kimberly Hamilton
Director of Operations, MCC / Business Development Manager
Having joined Integra in 2012, Kimberly has provided technical and operational support for over 20 projects at the firm over the past decade. Currently, she serves as the Director of Operations for Integra’s Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) portfolio, working alongside technical staff and MCC representatives to ensure projects and deliverables meet client expectations and contractual requirements. She also serves the dual role of Business Development Manager, working directly with the CEO and CTO to pursue, manage, and execute partnerships and proposal efforts. This includes potential opportunities with a variety of USG-funded clients such as USAID, MCC, and the World Bank, among others.
Kimberly also provides operational and technical support on projects. This includes her current role as Operations Manager and Researcher for USAID’s performance evaluation of the U.S. Women’s Global Development and Prosperity Initiative, the first government-wide effort to advance women’s economic empowerment. She also provides operational oversight of Integra’s two-year-long engagement with USAID to support Vietnam’s development and implementation of public-private partnerships. In previous positions, she conducted field research for a variety of agricultural, M&E, and political economy activities, mostly in Southeast Asia and East Africa. Her favorite assignment to date was conducting field research for an agricultural market assessment in the Philippines for MCC, specifically focused on the value and supply chains of processed mango products. In addition to interviewing and analyzing data from smallholder farmers, mango traders, and exporters to inform MCC’s investments, mango tastings were a nice perk of the job.
Pin Thanesnant
Director of Operations, USAID Portfolio
Ms. Ganyapak (Pin) Thanesnant currently serves as the Director of Operations for Integra’s USAID portfolio. She brings ten years of experience in project management and operations, resource mobilization, and policy and market assessments, specifically in areas of food security and the business enabling environment. She has managed projects and implemented reform efforts across twenty countries in Africa and Asia. She oversees all operations and finances of Integra’s flagship contracts: USAID’s Learning, Evaluation, and Analysis Project III (LEAP III) and USAID’s Asia Emerging Opportunities (AEO). Under both contracts, she ensures rapid responses to rigorous, independent, and high-quality analytical services to USAID.
In just three years of LEAP III, Pin has managed over 50 activities across 30 countries and multiple sectors. In addition to project management, she also provides technical support on activities—most recently, serving as the Policy Expert for USAID’s Bangladesh Agriculture Policy Assessment, as well as the Evaluation Expert conducting an ex-post evaluation of USAID/Zambia’s Production, Finance, and Improved Technology Plus (PROFIT+) program and a mid-term evaluation of USAID/Belarus’ I3 program.
Prior to joining Integra, Ms. Thanesnant worked with Heifer International, managing all funding efforts in East Asia and Southern/East African countries through donor relations, contractual negotiations, and development and review of technical and cost proposals. Prior to this, she worked at Fintrac, Inc., where she was responsible for providing analytical services under USAID’s EAT Project. Pin holds an MA in Public Anthropology and International Development from American University and a BA in International Studies from the University of Richmond.
Brenna Casey
Operations Specialist
Brenna Casey joined Integra as an Associate in November 2018. She performs project backstopping for USAID and Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) projects, including but not limited to development of SOWs/concept notes; consultant recruitment and contracting; budget development, reporting and analysis; quality assurance and contractual compliance; travel coordination and logistics; project reporting; and project launch and close out activities. Other responsibilities include contributing to technical desk research and report writing. She also supports new business development, including responding to SSNs and RFIs, and past performance write ups, RFP/RFQ compliance, recruiting and personnel matrices, and coordination with partners and preparation of teaming agreements and cost information for proposals.
Brenna also currently serves as Private Sector Engagement (PSE) Specialist under Integra’s PSE practice area. She serves as Operations Lead for a $1.5M+ PSE Activity under the USAID LEAP III contract, where she works with a team of 12+ consultants in the co-creation and implementation of PSE Action Plans for the Middle East Bureau and nine Operating Units in the region. Activities include Bureau and Mission workshops and trainings, a listening tour, development of Mission PSE portfolio reviews and integration analyses, a PSE thought piece, and remote and in-person private sector outreach. Under this activity, she participated in a 2-week field visit across four cities in Morocco and interviewed private sector actors representing five key sectors, as well as 1-week of PSE brainstorming sessions with USAID/Egypt staff in Cairo for their PSE Action Plan and CDCS. Her favorite experience to date was leading the PSE brainstorming session with the Basic Education technical team in Cairo. As PSE Specialist, Ms. Casey has also provided technical support to the USAID/Egypt 2020 Private Sector Landscape Assessment (PSLA).
Ms. Casey holds a BA in Foreign Affairs and Psychology and a minor in Religous Studies (Islam) from the University of Virginia. She is professionally certified in Project Management from the University of Virginia and the Project Management Institute. She is currently applying to pursue her graduate studies in Washington, D.C. In her free time she loves reading a good book on the Rappahannock River in Urbanna, Virginia.
Ms. Cazier serves as an Associate at Integra, providing project management support for the USAID LEAP III and AEO projects, as well as business development support for new opportunities. Prior to joining Integra, Isabella worked on the Programs team at World Learning, managing international youth exchange programs across the Americas. She has worked extensively in Latin America on youth development programs, and credits this opportunity with shaping her interest in international affairs. Isabella is PMI certified, and holds an MA in International Affairs and Development from The George Washington University, and a BA in Anthropology and Russian Literature from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas.
Isabella started at Integra in February 2020, and has worked on a range of projects, including the Tiger Matters Knowledge Management events which coincided with World Wildlife Day, the assessment of Democracy, Rights and Governance in the Pacific Islands region and the Mid-Term Evaluation of USAID/Rwanda’s Hinga Weze program. Working at a small business like Integra means that employees have the opportunity to develop professional skills very quickly, and the expertise on the team always leads to fascinating conversations around the virtual lunch table.
Isabella moved around a lot growing up, living in four countries before moving to the United States for college.
Ganyapak (Pin) Thanesnant Director of Operations
Ms. Ganyapak (Pin) Thanesnant currently serves as the Director of Operations for Integra’s USAID portfolio. She brings ten years of experience in project management and operations, resource mobilization, and policy and market assessments, specifically in areas of food security and the business enabling environment. She has managed projects and implemented reform efforts across twenty countries in Africa and Asia. She oversees all operations and finances of Integra’s flagship contracts: USAID’s Learning, Evaluation, and Analysis Project III (LEAP III) and USAID’s Asia Emerging Opportunities (AEO). Under both contracts, she ensures rapid responses to rigorous, independent, and high-quality analytical services to USAID.
In just three years of LEAP III, Pin has managed over 50 activities across 30 countries and multiple sectors. In addition to project management, she also provides technical support on activities—most recently, serving as the Policy Expert for USAID’s Bangladesh Agriculture Policy Assessment, as well as the Evaluation Expert conducting an ex-post evaluation of USAID/Zambia’s Production, Finance, and Improved Technology Plus (PROFIT+) program and a mid-term evaluation of USAID/Belarus’ I3 program.
Prior to joining Integra, Ms. Thanesnant worked with Heifer International, managing all funding efforts in East Asia and Southern/East African countries through donor relations, contractual negotiations, and development and review of technical and cost proposals. Prior to this, she worked at Fintrac, Inc., where she was responsible for providing analytical services under USAID’s EAT Project.
Pin holds an MA in Public Anthropology and International Development from American University and a BA in International Studies from the University of Richmond. While Ms. Thanesnant has spent over eight years in Washington, D.C., she was raised in six countries before coming to the United States to pursue her undergraduate degree. She is fluent in Thai and English, and conversational in French. She enjoys cooking, swimming, and going on hikes with her German Shepherd, Havana. More details can be found here.
