Damian von Stauffenberg

President of the Educational Initiative for Central and Eastern Europe

Damian von Stauffenberg, a German national, is the president of the Educational Initiative for Central and Eastern Europe.

He is an expert in international finance and developing nations. Mr. von Stauffenberg built up 25 years of experience at the World Bank and its private sector affiliate, International Finance Corporation, before founding MicroRate - a rating agency for microfinance institutions.

In addition, he serves on a variety of microlending funds and committees, such as ProFund - a fund investing in the equity of Latin American microlenders, and Seed Capital Development Foundation (SCDF) - an organization dedicated to linking microlenders to commercial funding sources.

Mr. von Stauffenberg has over ten years of experience with the situation in post-Communist Russia which led, in 2001, to his becoming the first president of the Educational Initiative for Central and Eastern Europe.