ULF FÄRNSVEDEN, CEO

Nationality
Swedish

Profession
Gender mainstreaming, women’s economic empowerment and equal opportunities expert, CEO

Education

M.Sc. in International Development Studies at Sida (Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency) and PADRIGU (The Peace and Development Research Institute at Gothenburg University) and M.Sc. in International Economics specializing in Spanish and finance from Gothenburg University/Brighton Business School/La Universidad de Valencia. ISO 14001, courses in anti-corruption and gender-sensitive budgeting

Key qualifications
Ulf is an economist with 30 years of experience from development cooperation and 22 years of working with gender equality issues. Some of the main topics have been inclusion of women in the labour market, and gender & environment. Ulf has also worked with gender at institutional level by supporting national gender authorities (four countries in the Balkans, Ecuador, and Guerrero State) and in gender planning and organisation in the Ministry of Environment in Kosovo, gender audits, women entrepreneurs, male involvement, and gender analysis.

Ulf has qualified competences in results-based management (RBM), outcome mapping and identification, appraisals, implementation, management and monitoring and evaluation of development projects. He has carried out and supported gender country analysis in many countries and different financing agencies such as EBRD, European Commission (EC), Inter-American Development Bank (IADB), Sida, and seven different UN agencies.

Ulf has been involved in project management of international programmes and projects since 1990. Ulf also has experience of SME Business Centres and Local Economic Development, TVET, micro financing alternatives, social protection, social and labour inclusion, in strategic planning and organisation, training needs assessment (TNA), development of gender curricula, training, production of training material for governments and private companies. Two of Ulf’s projects are heavily promoted as best practice projects, one by the EC and the other by IADB.

Sector experience
More than 22 years working with gender issues, mainly concerning women in the labour market, SME, gender & environment, gender mainstreaming, gender management, women’s economic empowerment, male involvement and fundraising.

Country experience
Albania, Argentina, Belgium, Cambodia, Costa Rica, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Egypt, Finland, Georgia, Guatemala, Honduras, Hungary, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, North Macedonia, Mexico, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Serbia, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Tajikistan, Turkey, Ukraine, Uruguay and USA.

Languages                          
Swedish – Mother tongue
English – Full professional proficiency
Spanish – Full professional proficiency
Portuguese – Minimum professional proficiency