Experienced. Pragmatic.
Ready for the future of urban migration.
We are a joint venture of individuals and organizations dedicated to addressing the challenges of the informal economy through sustainable development zones, or SDZs. Together, we bring expertise in international politics, post-conflict management including economic reconstruction, institution building, migration management, humanitarian and development policies, special economic zones, and urban planning and management.
With our extensive network of public and private partners tailored to meet the needs of specific projects, we offer solutions that help meet the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and create cities where migrants can work and thrive.
The SDZ Alliance is:
The SDZ Alliance Team
Joachim Ruecker
Political and Economic Specialist / ChairPerson
Joachim Ruecker is an economist with PhD, independent consultant and former Ambassador of Germany. His current focus is on post-crisis Economic Reconstruction, Special Economic Zones and Sustainable Development Zones. He has advised various private and public clients (including heads of government) and has broad experience in diplomacy, politics, administration and finance, decentralization, local governance, public infrastructure & housing, the structuring & steering of utilities and privatization strategies.
Until 2017, Joachim Ruecker was also the Special Representative of the Federal Government of Germany for the Middle East Stability Partnership. In this capacity, he was engaged in implementing the “Jordan Compact”, a project combining Special Economic Zones in Jordan with new job opportunities for Jordanian citizens and Syrian Refugees. Previous positions include Permanent Representative to the UN in Geneva, President of the UN Human Rights Council and Head of the UN Interim Administration / Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General in Kosovo.
In the first phase of his service in Kosovo, Joachim Ruecker was responsible for Economic Reconstruction. He conducted comprehensive programs for privatization and for re-structuring public enterprises and helped laying the foundations for a functioning market economy including the creation of industrial parks / special economic zones. For almost a decade, he served as Mayor of the industrial city of Sindelfingen in Germany (home of Mercedes production).
Previous/Other Positions
Special Representative of Germany for the Middle East Stability Partnership
Permanent Representative to the UN in Geneva
President of the UN Human Rights Council
Head of the UN Interim Administration / Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General in Kosovo
Mayor of Sindelfingen, Germany (home of Mercedes production)
Joris Benninga
Entrepreneurship and SME Specialist
Joris has been a renewable energy professional and entrepreneur for the past 25 years. He has a master’s degree in economics from the University of Amsterdam. In his renewable energy work, he developed a thorough generalist skill set while successfully building consulting and project development teams in the Netherlands, Italy and the US. When returning to Europe from a five-year stint in the US in 2015, Joris was struck by the general lack of vigor and creativity in the European handling of the Syrian refugee crisis. He decided to use his deep knowledge of the energy transition, to develop a root cause solution for reducing forced migration. With a new team, partly consisting of Syrian refugees, he formed a social enterprise called GreenfieldCities. GreenfieldCities’ goal is to develop and operate Youth Business Campuses in areas suffering from forced migration. In a Youth Business Campus, young talents can learn, live and work in a safe and enabling environment. A first Youth Business Campus for up to 3.000 young Jordanians and Syrians is being developed in Mafraq, Jordan.
Previous/Other Positions
Founder / CEO, GreenfieldCities
VP Business Development, SkyGeo
Founding Partner, Real NewEnergy
Kilian Kleinschmidt
Humanitarian Relief and Forced Displacement Specialist / Board Member
Kilian Kleinschmidt believes in the power of connectivity and that we can fix it all through better and more effective access of the disadvantaged populations and fragile regions to the immense wealth of knowhow, technologies and finance we have accumulated collectively. It is his conviction that the global brain and the collective resilience grows with every connection made successfully solving a challenge and seizing an opportunity.
Kilian is an international networker, development and migration expert with 30 years of experience in a wide range of countries, emergencies and refugee camps as United Nations official, Aid worker and Diplomat. He is the CEO of the startup Innovation and Planning Agency (IPA) of the 21st century through its project “IUMEE United Resources powered by SWITXBOARD. He is currently developing and advising a number of ventures which aim at sustainable investment and social impact in very fragile environments. His work on emerging cities, Special Development Zones and urbanization of refugee camps is widely recognized as the way forward dealing with mass migration, population shifts and transformation of society. He is challenging the Humanitarian Aid Sector through a range of new and unorthodox partnerships, technologies and ways of financing building on networking and swarm intelligence rather than hierarchies and ineffective bureaucracies.
He became known as the “Mayor of Za'atari" when he managed the refugee camp of Za'atari in Northern Jordan from 2013-2014 on behalf of UNHCR. Za'atari has become a symbol for new and innovative approaches in refugee and humanitarian management under his leadership. His career included positions as Deputy Humanitarian Coordinator for Somalia, Deputy Special Envoy for Assistance to Pakistan, Director for Communities and Minorities in the UN administration in Kosovo, Executive Secretary for the Migration and Refugee Initiative (MARRI) in the Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe and many field based functions with UNHCR, UNDP and WFP. He worked extensively in Africa, South Eastern Europe, Pakistan and Sri Lanka and during the European refugee crisis advised the Austrian Minister of Interior on Refugee reception centres. Most recently he was a Special Advisor to the German Minister of Development on refugee issues and innovative partnerships (2016) and is advising Austrian Chancellor Christian Kern on migration issues in Africa.
He is a public speaker and coach and has published three books - “Weil es um die Menschen geht” (ECON 2015) , “Beyond Survival” (Dumont-Mair 2016) and “Tod dem Helfer” (Dumont-Mair 2017) and authored a number of articles on refugee and migration issues. He is a renowned public speaker in conferences, TEDx and other events.
Previous/Other Positions
Senior Field Coordinator of Zaatari Refugee Camp for UNHCR
Consultant to the Austrian Ministry of the Interior
Deputy Humanitarian Coordinator for Somalia
Deputy Special Envoy for Assistance to Pakistan
Director for Communities and Minorities in the UN administration in Kosovo
Executive Secretary for the Migration and Refugee Initiative (MARRI) in the Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe
Founder and Chairman, IPA|Switxboard
Kissy Agyeman-Togobo
Investment-Climate Specialist / Board Member
A lawyer and risk manager by training, Kissy obtained an LLB in English and French Law in 2003 from Leicester University and Jean Moulin (Lyon III) and went on to pursue a postgraduate in Risk Management in Developing Countries at Sciences Politiques, Bordeaux the following year. Kissy co-founded Songhai Advisory in 2010 having already worked with leading international risk and global information consultancies focused on Sub-Saharan Africa. Having obtained a diploma with the International Compliance Association in Governance, Risk & Compliance in 2016, her legal and analytical rigour have been further heightened within the context of ethical business practices.
With close to 15 years’ experience of analysing the political economy of Sub Saharan African markets, Kissy has a solid understanding of the investment climate in the sub-region and has jointly conceived of the company’s investment climate analysis model, reputational due diligence, strategic advisory and other service areas. She has led on a number of impact-related projects at the firm, most notably in the coordination and oversight of research in relation to social entrepreneurship on various research themes over the past five years, including women’s empowerment and job creation on behalf of the British Council. Kissy has also led on extensive field research in both Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire within farming communities to better understand supply chain opportunities and risks across cocoa and oil palm supply chains.
Prior to co-founding Songhai Advisory with Nana Adu Ampofo, Kissy was a Senior Country Analyst with global information service provider, IHS, where she cultivated a reputation as an authority for appraising how cross-border transactions in Sub Saharan Africa can be impacted by risk, specific to these jurisdictions. She has been widely quoted in the media and the theoretical discipline of analysis has been complemented by extensive travel and research within the sub-region. For five years, she was a board member of one of the foremost Africa business networks in the UK, the Business Council for Africa (now Invest Africa) and presently serves as a trustee of Footprints Africa, a third-sector organisation which works to empower businesses to be a force for good by advocating the B Corp strategy for business in Africa. Kissy remains committed to using intelligence – sovereign, market, corporate and leadership – to inspire transformative development in Sub Saharan Africa and as such, plays a key role in building the company’s network across each of the 20 markets in which it operates.
Na'amal's collaboration with SDZ Alliance would allow individuals to not only have access to local employment in the specially created economic zones but also have the skills and opportunity to access global opportunities, through technology and the Internet.
Lorraine Charles / Na’amal
Livelihoods Specialist / Board Member
Lorraine's expertise is in politics, political economy, development, education and livelihoods of the Middle East. She has also worked on issues related to the Syrian crisis since 2011. She has lived in the region since 2004.
She has worked as a research and policy consultant for the Global Business Coalition for Education, where work focused on the engagement of the private sector in education for Syrian children in Jordan, Lebanon, and Turkey. She also led a research project for the Emirates Diplomatic Academy, a body under the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs, conducting research around the livelihoods for Syrian Refugees in Jordan and Turkey. This research led her to the realisation that the main barriers facing Syrian refugees accessing dignified employment are the protectionist labour market mechanisms and the lack of jobs in the host economies. This led her to begin promoting a paradigm shift in the way that employment for refugees is conceptualised, where the global private sector provides remote employment where refugees are hosted. This lead to the creation of Na’amal, which aims to provide training in the soft skills required for remote work and then link refugees to the remote private sector.
Lorraine Charles is also a Research Associate at the Centre for Business Research, University of Cambridge and project affiliate for Refugeework.net, a research project at the University of Edinburgh, which conducts research on digital refugees for refugees. She is also project manager for a volunteer education and livelihood project that provides support to vulnerable Syrian families.
Previous/Other POsitions
Director and Co-Founder, Na’amal
Research Associate, Centre for Business Research, University of Cambridge
Chief Impact Officer, Amplio Ventures
Project Affiliate, Refugeework.net, University of Edinburgh
Director of Development (GCC), RBK
Research and Policy Consultant, Global Business Coalition for Education
Michael Castle-Miller
SDZ Governance Specialist / Board Member
Michael is a legal and policy consultant who has helped develop special economic zone (SEZ) programs in over twenty countries in Africa, Latin America, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, East Asia, and the Pacific. Over the course of his career, governments and private companies have relied on him to draft regulations, establish administrative agencies, introduce investment climate reforms, structure public-private partnerships, and promote socially and environmentally responsible development projects.
As founder and CEO of Politas Consulting, Michael's professional experience ranges from legal and policy consulting to real estate negotiation, and from organizational management to community engagement. Michael has served as the Managing Director of Locus Economica, a boutique SEZ consulting firm advising on numerous World Bank, UNIDO, and direct-government projects. He has also been a consultant with the World Bank, Legal Vice Presidency, specializing in urban law and development issues. Before that, he worked for the Public International Law and Policy Group.
He is a member of the Pacific Council on International Policy and a Senior Program Officer of WEPZA, a trade association of SEZ practitioners. He is also an active member of the New York State Bar Association and licensed to practice law in New York.
Previous/Other POsitions
CEO, Politas Consulting
Executive Director, Refugee Cities
Managing Director, Locus Economica
Consultant, World Bank
Research Associate, Public International Law and Policy Group
isadora darwich
Conflict Resolution Specialist / Board Member
Isadora Darwich is a Brazilian international mediator and social entrepreneur focused on empowerment through economic emancipation. She has multidisciplinary academic and professional background that allows her to work on projects and initiatives in various areas, from public and international relations to conflict resolution, management and coordination, bringing creative and innovative solutions.
Graduated in International Relations at Ibmec, while assisting the research of the Head of International Relations Department, Isadora also did a diplomatic internship at the Consulate of India. Subsequently, gained valuable experience conducting public policy research in Washington D.C. representing Latin America at The Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity (Cato Institute).
Returning to Brazil, she worked at LIVRES in the implementation of public policies aimed at social inclusion and economic emancipation. Soon after, she specialized in conflict resolution and mediation, while opening and managing her own company, Soul Kombucha. After two successful years she shifted areas to work as a full time mediator and coordinator of the Satisfactio Conciliation and Mediation.
In 2020, after completing the specialization in Systemic Psychotherapy and Family Intervention, she moved to the Amazon border to work with the Venezuelan refugees migrating to Brazil. There Isadora facilitated intercultural mediation, adaptation and professional training, as well as developed and taught the empowerment and entrepreneurship program she designed for Venezuelan refugees, "Força Mulheres".
Conducting intercultural mediations and daily assisting refugees that had walked 5 days barefoot just looking for an opportunity to rebuild their lives in Brazil, Isadora understood that promoting humane and orderly migration is entirely linked to, if not completely dependent upon, the economic empowerment of these vulnerable populations, and the only means to guarantee and foster long term well-being.
PREVIOUS/OTHER POSITIONS
International Outreach Director | Scaling Change
Refugee Assistant | Fraternity Without Borders
Coordinator of Innovation and Impact | Mediators Beyond Borders International
Parliamentary Advisor | Legislative Assembly of the State of Minas Gerais
Market Research Analyst | Charles Koch Foundation
Advisor and Mediator | Avante Social
Research Assistant | The Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity, Cato Institute
Cofounder | Soul Kombucha
Nana Adu Ampofo
Investment-Climate Specialist
Joint Managing Partner and Co-Founder of Songhai Advisory, Nana is an experienced and well-networked British and Ghanaian business leader dedicated to facilitating the growth and development of countries in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Before launching Songhai Advisory with Co-Founder Kissy in September 2010, that passion had already drawn Nana to work with the international market intelligence firm IHS as an economic and political risk specialist focusing on the region and before that as an economic advisor at the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). The latter focused on investment policy advisory initiatives requested by Nigeria and other African governments driving to attract FDI into areas of strategic import, and the former on multinational companies seeking to access opportunities and identify risks operating in the region.
Both positions facilitated growth in Nana’s professional network in Sub-Saharan Africa but also in international centres for cross-border investment flows and decision-making concerning the region – Accra, Geneva, London and New York. They also expanded on technical skills gained by way of an undergraduate in Politics and Economics from York University, a postgraduate in Economic Development and Policy Analysis from the University of Nottingham and early professional experience at the then UK Department for Trade and Industry.
These strands of interest and experience have served Songhai Advisory clients operating/seeking to operate in the region and have been bolstered by the same. Nana’s professional approach would be best described as strategic, genuine engagement and outcome orientation. In meeting him, you will find drive well balanced by humility.
Patrick Lamson-Hall
Urban Planner and Economic Development Specialist / Board member
Patrick is an urban planner and policy expert who advises clients around the world on a range of issues, including economic development, transportation, land use, housing, public service delivery, and feasibility studies. Most recently, he has developed strategies for stabilizing Libya through its cities; helped the government of Ethiopia prepare long-term plans for 18 of its cities in partnership with the Cities Alliance; conducted assessments of the quantity and quality of urban growth for the governments of Colombia, Ethiopia, and the Central African Republic; and measured access to public open space in a global sample of cities in preparation for monitoring a portion of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 11.
Patrick serves as a research scholar at the New York University (NYU) Urban Expansion Program at the Marron Institute and Stern School of Business. Past projects include the Atlas of Urban Expansion: 2016 Edition, created in partnership with the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy and UN Habitat. The Atlas studied the characteristics of growth in a global sample of 200 cities and a historical sample of 30 cities, using an innovative technique for satellite imagery analysis. In the course of that project, Patrick worked to establish the India Urban Expansion Observatory, a research facility created in partnership with the IDFC Foundation and housed at Mahatma Education Society in Navi Mumbai. Patrick also worked on the New York Densities Project, which used historical maps of built-up area and historical census data to produce an interactive display of the growth of New York and the change in population density over the 400-year history of the city. It is currently on display as part of the permanent exhibit at the MCNY.
Patrick’s work is oriented toward equality, prosperity, and sustainability. He believes that properly designed and managed cities can raise millions of people out of poverty and are critical to addressing issues of climate change and sustainability..
Previous/Other Positions
Research Scholar, NYU Urbanization Project
Adjunct Professor, New York University
Project Coordinator, Climate Resilient Cities: Grenada
Project Coordinator, India Urban Expansion Observatory
Project Coordinator, Ethiopia Urban Expansion Initiative
Get in touch.
If you would like to discuss the work of SDZ Alliance and our members, contact us today.