A seasoned environment and climate change expert, development finance specialist, climate diplomat and scientist with experience in public policy, programming, resource mobilisation, corporate governance, sustainable development, climate change, poverty and livelihood options, forestry and natural resources management. Veronica has experience in multilateral climate funds accreditation, preparation of project proposals for mobilising finance linked to climate and sustainable development finance. She is also an expert in developing innovative financing mechanisms and instruments, mainstreaming environmental, social and gender considerations in project development and implementation and conducting feasibility studies and project due diligence.
Throughout her 14-year career, supported sustainability, strategic long-termism and amplification of lessons from projects and programmes to foster impact and sustainable investments. She strives to promote green, inclusive, sustainable growth and development, empower women, eradicate poverty, build and strengthen transformative, low carbon and climate resilient solutions, advancing gender equality and improving the livelihoods of all Africans and the globe at large.
Veronica has experience in unlocking investment and finance, including small and growing businesses to address development challenges such as climate change, deforestation, access to portable water and clean energy, food security, poverty alleviation, markets value chains and market linkages.
She attended her first multilateral climate meeting in 2011, COP15 in Durban, South Africa. Since then, she has never looked back. Veronica has grown to become one of the key negotiators for the Government of Zimbabwe. She received her training on Climate Diplomacy with UNITAR in 2014 and in that same year she participated in the successful establishment of the Gender and Climate Change Lima Work Programme that was established in 2014 at COP20 in Lima, making Gender a standing Agenda in the Climate Meetings.
In 2015, she was seconded by the Government of Zimbabwe to support the Group of 77 and China as the lead coordinator for Gender and Climate Change and she attributes this experience as an amazing and learning moment for her, as she had to ensure that Gender was well covered in the Paris Agreement across different articles of the Agreement, a milestone in the climate change journey. In 2018, she was further seconded to support the African Group of Negotiators as the lead Coordinator and negotiator for Mitigation. Additionally, she has worked for the Government of Zimbabwe for 10 years and led the establishment of Climate Change Management Department, development of the Climate Policy and related strategies, accreditation of the Environmental Management Agency to the Adaptation Fund, and the Infrastructure Development Bank of Zimbabwe to the Green Climate Fund.
She also worked with the World Food Programme and the United Nations Development Programme to access and mobilize climate finance for projects worth over US$35 million, seeking to build resilience and impact over 2.1million lives. Being acutely aware of the need to multiply actors in the climate change space, particularly in climate diplomacy, climate finance including carbon markets and proposal development, she has been actively engaged in imparting knowledge and skills to others including conducting trainings, supervising related theses and conducting mentorship programmes
