Christina Barrineau

Christina Barrineau is the Managing Director of the Financial Access Initiative 1, a research consortium of leading development economists with the goal of expanding access to financial services for low-income individuals in developing countries.

Christina also led the United Nations International Year of Microcredit2 where she brought global attention to the importance of microfinance and engaged hundreds of thousands of people, from princesses to bankers to microentrepreneurs, in building inclusive financial sectors. Christina has worked for Women’s World Banking (WWB)3 where she established and managed the Global Network for Banking Innovation in Microfinance, and before joining WWB, she spent ten years as an independent international advisor in finance and development. In this role, she launched more than 20 businesses and non-profit institutions in the fields of microfinance, the environment, the arts, and social change. Among other accolades, she has worked with Dr. Jeffery Sachs on issues specific to eradicating poverty in Africa and was a champion of the Malaria No More campaign. Under the leadership of Dr. Stanley Fischer, she worked to ensure the Bretton Woods Institutions collected data on access to finance. She pioneered new thinking on pension plans for the poor and asset building models for informal sector workers and established the Global Microentrepreneurship Awards Program, now owned by Citigroup, in more than 30 countries. She is an Advisor to UNEPFI African Commercial Microfinance Initiative and the Citigroup Microfinance Fund. Christina is a well known public speaker on microfinance, holds an MBA from the University of British Columbia and is a Canadian national.

External links

• Financial Access Initiative official website
• International Year of Microcredit 2005 official website
• Women's World Banking official website
• Sierra Leone’s Mama Fatu Kanu thanks Christina Barrineau, Chief Technical Advisor to the International Year of Microcredit
• Barrineau leading the world in the year of microcredit
• Working Through the Concept of Micro-Finance Barrineau on NPR
• Barrineau speaking with High Water Women