Ndaya Beltchika is IFAD's Lead Technical Specialist - Gender, Targeting and Social Inclusion.

Previously, Beltchika was Country Director in the West and Central Africa Division where she led the development of country strategies and provided oversight and coordinated programmes of loans and grants of Benin, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

Prior to joining IFAD in 2010, Beltchika worked for over 25 years in private sector development, policy dialogue, rural development and rural finance. Earlier positions included Principal at ES&S Consulting, providing business strategy advice to small and medium private institutions; Senior Financial Analyst in corporate finance; advisor to the CFO and President of Institutional Sales at Fidelity Investments; and economist at Associates for International Resources and Development to support policy changes and development programmes in a number of WCA countries.

Beltchika holds a Bachelor’s +1 in Agronomy from La Faculté des Sciences Agronomique de l’Etat à Gembloux, Belgium, a Master’s in Agricultural Economics from the University of California at Davis, California, United States, and a Master’s in Business Administration from Babson College F. W. Olin Graduate School of Business, Massachusetts, United States.