Board of Directors
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Management
Direct conservation and grants investments
Fundraising
Management
Mr. Ostenda joined the Board in 2021. He is a partner at the global investment bank Goldman Sachs, serving as a member of the Healthcare Investment Banking team responsible for diagnostics and the life sciences tools sector. There he assists leading companies around the globe in obtaining funding and making investment decisions, many of which pertain to cutting-edge life sciences research. Prior to joining Goldman Sachs, Mr. Ostenda worked at Monitor Group and Global Prior Art. He earned his undergraduate degree in Biochemical Sciences from Harvard College in 1999 and MBA in Finance from Kellogg School of Management in 2005. Mr. Ostenda also serves on the board of Fondazione per i Collegi del Mondo Unito Stock Weinberg – Edward Sutcliffe supporting United World Colleges, a global movement focused on fostering international understanding through high school education.
Fernando Ortiz was born in Guayaquil, mainland Ecuador and moved to Galapagos a couple of years after completing his training as marine biologist. He completed his qualifications as a naturalist guide and dive instructor which took him, along with other colleagues, to underwater places seldomly explored before. After almost a decade as dive guide, Fernando worked as operations manager for a diving tour company, prior to joining the Galapagos National Park as head of the Marine Resources department. After that, he became head of the Galapagos chapter for a Conservation NGO.
During the last eight years, he came back to the trails as a Naturalist Guide once again, staying busy with his family, photography, cooking and other personal projects. Fernando lives in Puerto Ayora, Santa Cruz Island.
Mercy J. Borbor Córdova, Ph.D. MSc, is Associate Professor at the Faculty of Maritime Engineering and Sea Sciences at the Escuela Superior Politecnica del Litoral, Guayaquil Ecuador.Oceanographer with a doctorate at the College of Environmental Science and Forestry at the State University of New York. Mercy is an interdisciplinary scientist working on the interactions among natural or human systems and the climate effects on society. She managed to combine roles as both researcher and public officer involved in decision making processes at local, regional and national level in areas of environmental management, urban resilience and vulnerability, disaster risk reduction,Antarctic environment, and climate change. As public officer she has served as Chief of Environmental Control for the City of Guayaquil, Province Director of Risk Disaster Management for Guayas, and Vice minister of the Ministry of Environment for Ecuador playing an active role at the Climate Change National Committee. Selected as Lead Author for the Assessment Report 6 (AR6) in the Mitigation Working Group, Chapter 13 of institutions and subnationals (2019-2022) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Ecuadorian expert in the Capacity Development for Climate Services (CD-CS) Team within the Climatology Commission at the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). Board member at the Galapagos Conservancy and member of the Science and Policy Advisory Committee of the Inter-American Institute for Global Change Research (IAI).
Hazel Wong is a tenacious advocate for conservation. Under her tenure as Director of Global Conservation Campaigns, The Nature Conservancy has generated over $60 billion in public funding through ballots measures at the state and local levels for natural resources protection. Her boundless energy, ability to motivate voters to support conservation efforts, and talent for making conceptual ideas tangible has gained her respect and admiration from internal colleagues and partner organizations who benefit from her efforts.
Hazel has spent the last 18 years leveraging her knowledge of communication, and the political and policy process to promote The Nature Conservancy’s legislative agenda in support of its mission to protect the lands and waters on which all life depends. She has used this experience in public opinion research, strategic message development, and political campaign tactics to create a groundswell of public support for conservation funding and policy initiatives. Her team has an 88 percent winning rate at the ballot box because of their ability to translate and analyze both qualitative and quantitative data to determine the viability of their campaigns.
Before joining The Nature Conservancy, Hazel had a long and distinguished career in both politics and the broadcast media. She coordinated candidate campaigns for the Nevada State Democratic Party. She was also an assignment editor, producer, and announcer on local TV and radio.
In addition to Hazel’s professional responsibilities, she is an annual guest lecturer at Yale University in conservation financing, and she has chaired several philanthropic and social organizations and committees.
Hazel’s educational background includes a Master’s degree in Political Science from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and a Bachelor’s degree in Communication from California State University, Fullerton.
Born in Seychelles, a group of islands off the East Coast of Africa, Hazel has been at the forefront of researching how to engage communities of color in conservation and has been an advocate on diversifying the conservation community.
Eileen Fargis is Managing Director, Private Equity Sustainable Infrastructure for Ecofin Investments LLC. She manages a team that acts as Investment Advisor to the Ecofin U.S. Renewables Infrastructure Trust, a U.S. focused renewables investment fund traded on the London Stock Exchange. Previously, Eileen was Head of Investments for InterEnergy Holdings (UK) Ltd, an independent developer, owner, operator of energy generation assets and a utility in the Caribbean and Latin America. Reporting directly to the CEO, she was accountable for investment decisions in new assets, geographies and technologies. The portfolio grew from 400 MW to 2.2 GW during the time Eileen was involved with the company. Eileen has demonstrated her leadership experience in multinational environments, having worked for GE, the International Finance Corporation and others, covering geographies including China, India, the Middle East, Africa, the Caribbean, Latin America, Western Europe and the U.S. Eileen has built a reputation for honesty and integrity, for her passionate commitment to sustainability and the energy transition, and for providing clear strategic and investment advice to Boards and Investment Committees. Her prior Board roles include InterEnergy Holdings, Hoteles City Express (the fastest-growing limited-service hotel chain in Mexico) and SURA Asset Management (the largest pension management firm in Latin America, a subsidiary of Grupo SURA). She is a graduate of Hamilton College and the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and resides in Greenwich, CT.
Agostina Pechi is managing director, head of EM and commodities local sales and structured credit sales in Latin America for Goldman Sachs based in New York. In her current role, Agostina is focused on delivering innovation to the firm’s clients in Latin America across the Global Currencies and Emerging Markets, Credit, Rates and Commodities businesses. She is the co-head of the Global Banking and Markets Division Women’s Network, and is a member of the Managing Director Steering Committee for the Firmwide Hispanic/Latino Network. Prior to joining Goldman Sachs, she worked at Credit Suisse for two years and at Deutsche Bank in London and New York for five years. Agostina serves on the Executive Board of ProjectArt, a nonprofit organization that provides free art education to children in New York, Detroit, Miami, Los Angeles, Pittsburgh, Chicago, New Orleans, and San Francisco. Agostina earned a BA in Economics from the Torcuato Di Tella University in 2006.
Dr. Janet Kiholm Smith is Emerita Professor of Economics at Claremont McKenna College, where she held the Von Tobel Chair. She received her Ph.D. in economics from UCLA, and has been on the faculties of Arizona State University, University of Southern California, and Oberlin College. At CMC, she was Director of the Center for Innovation & Entrepreneurship and was Founding Dean of the Robert Day School of Economics and Finance, Chair of the Department of Economics, and Director of the Financial Economics Institute. Her current research interests are in the areas of entrepreneurship and venture capital. She is coauthor of four books, including Entrepreneurial Finance: Venture Capital, Deal Structure and Valuation (Stanford University Press, 2019). She has over 40 publications, with papers appearing in such refereed journals as Journal of Finance, Journal of Financial & Quantitative Analysis, Journal of Corporate Finance, Journal of Legal Studies, Journal of Law, Economics & Organization, and Journal of Industrial Economics. Dr. Smith has consulted for major corporations and the FTC on various matters. She currently serves on the editorial boards of Strategic Change and Review of Corporate Finance and has served as a grant review section panelist for the NSF.
Ethan is a partner at Morgan Lewis in Miami and New York. He counsels clients on a variety of international regulatory and transactional matters with a focus on fund formation and investment outside of the United States. He has traveled for work and pleasure extensively in Latin America, Europe, the Middle East and Asia. A frequent author and lecturer, Ethan addresses topics including the global distribution of investment funds, investment in emerging markets and corporate governance. He is the managing editor of the Morgan Lewis Hedge Fund Deskbook, published by Thomson Reuters/West. Ethan has had a life-long fascination for evolution and ecology and has collected through the years many of the writings of the great explorers and naturalists. He is a graduate of Harvard College and Emory University School of Law. He has served on the boards of a number of civic, charitable, cultural and social organizations.