Agriculture & Rural Development

MSc Corporate Communications and Development Cooperation specialist, with experience in European projects, the achievement of public and private funds, the administration of profit and non-profit organisations and the management of projects for social promotion, in Europe and Latin America.

During the last 7 years, Patricia has been working as Project Manager and Communication Expert in a series of advocacy campaigns for European funded projects and for the European Commission Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development.

Policy Adviser in the Unit dealing with strategic partnerships with Africa and in particular, the African Union. Following up the files related to agriculture, food and nutrition, natural resources, biodiversity.

Euroclima is the European Union’s flagship Programme with the Latin America and Caribbean region that contributes to an increasingly ambitious, transformative and equitable action on climate and environmental issues. Through bilateral dialogues and regional engagement, the Programme works together with the 33 partner governments of the region and relevant regional organisations to identify priorities that lead to actions that foster the conditions for a Green and Just Transition.

Euroclima is a Programme under the Global Gateway strategy, co-funded by the European Union and the German federal government through the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ),

Euroclima is implemented in the spirit of Team Europe and through the synergistic work of eight agencies from EU Member States and the United Nations: Agencia Española de Cooperación Internacional para el Desarrollo (AECID), Agence française de développement (AFD) Group (AFD and Expertise France), Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), Fundación Internacional y para Iberoamérica de Administración y Políticas Públicas (FIIAPP), Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). 

Head of section OPSYS contract management

Blerina Vila has nearly two decades of experience (most of which at international level) in institutional capacity building and policy advice on development planning with a rights-based approach, with focus on gender equality and child labour. For the past 12 years she has worked closely with the European Commission as expert on gender equality mainstreaming contributing to identifying feasible solutions to the problems posed by the delivery of technical assistance in areas such as human rights and governance, education and health reform, commerce, infrastructure, nutrition, food security and social protection, reform of the judiciary system, and how gender issues and women's rights need to be integrated into them. Until end of 2014 worked as a programme officer with the Gender and Non Discrimination Programme at the International Training Centre of ILO (ITCILO  http://gender.itcilo.org/cms/). Currently she is director of consultancy firm Wexam Consulting vof.

In 2015 she assisted the EC’s and EU Member States’ Task Force that drafted the EU Gender Action Plan 2016 – 2020 (http://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2015/10/26-fac-c…), including working very closely with the DEVCO B Directorate in identifying institutional mechanisms to facilitate its implementation. Currently she is the leader of the team of experts tasked to assist the EC and EU Delegations to comply with the GAP requirement of generating and using gender analysis for purposes of planning the cooperation with partner countries.

She is fluent in Albanian, English, French, Italian, has a good knowledge of Spanish and Dutch. She is based in Belgium.

The consultant has a solid background in the field of food and nutrition security for ensuing active and healthy life, has over 25 years of international experience involving communication with various stakeholders, policy-making and strategic planning, results-based management and performance monitoring, and implementation of plans and activities. He is a specialist in agriculture, food and nutri-tion and transformation of agri-food systems, with experience in International Cooperation.
• Over 20 years of experience in the agriculture, food and nutrition sector providing technical assistance to strengthen the capacity of Ministries and relevant authorities with regards to de-veloping Agriculture, Food and Nutrition Policies
• Experience as Team Leader of numerous projects addressing agriculture, food security, and rural development, including conducting evaluations in fragile contexts.
• Solid track record in programme and project management, well prepared to undertake devel-opment and monitoring and review of operational plans, and providing support to implementing them and addressing cross-cutting issues (gender equality, environmental sustainability, and good governance issues).
• Solid track record of conducting evaluations, analysing projects relevance, performance and contribution to development objectives, including relevant aspects of intervention logic and re-sults framework and workplans.
• Angus has worked on food systems and business development across various relevant sub-sectors.
• Good capacity to analyse key actors and business environment. He is well experienced in broad based socio-economic development and poverty reduction processes.
• Solid career in support to programming, risk analyses and the identification of mitigating measures, organizational capacity development, management, and consultation and continu-ous learning processes.
• Practical expertise in capacity building and institutional development, including the provision of training and conducting of workshops.
• Frequent Team leader of multidisciplinary teams

In 2016 and 2017 he he worked in South Sudan in the role of Monitoring and Evaluation_Team Leader
Technical support and advisory services to increase the effectiveness of EU financed Rural Development interventions (FSTP, SORUDEV and ZEAT-BEAD) to support the South Sudan Development Plan 2011-2016 to reduce the vulnerability of rural communities and enhance their agricultural productivity and food security. Key areas of support: 1) Monitoring and coordination of actions; 2) Organising extension services; 3) Supporting calls for proposals and new projects; 4) Evaluating programme performance. Beneficiaries are the implementing partners and key stakeholders of the EU's rural development programmes in South Sudan.