Daniela Chiriac is a Manager at Climate Policy Initiative, where she leads research on climate finance for agriculture, land use and food systems across workstreams, as well as on climate adaptation and nature-positive finance projects.

Daniela is leading CPI’s team acting as the Secretariat for the ClimateShot Investor Coalition (CLIC), an action-oriented initiative launched by UK FCDO at COP26 to accelerate and scale up investments in agriculture and food systems with focus on climate and nature benefits.

Daniela managed the Sustainable Agriculture stream of the Global Innovation Lab for Climate Finance and the establishment of the new Southern Africa Regional stream. This included analytical work to develop and refine innovative financial instruments targeting land restauration, climate-smart agriculture and Renewable Energy Credits (RECs). She also played a leading role in crystallizing the Lab impact assessment methodology of financial solutions active in agriculture, forestry and other land use (AFOLU).

For the climate finance tracking programme, Daniela is providing contributions to CPI’s flagship publication The Global Landscape of Climate Finance, as well as related work, on matters relevant to AFOLU. In addition, she was the lead author of the CPI report Examining the Climate Finance Gap for Small-Scale Agriculture, which provides a framework for tracking and first of its kind insights into the level of climate finance flowing towards small-scale agriculture in developing countries.

Since June 2022, Daniela is also serving on the U.S. Subcommittee on Systemic Solutions for Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation in Agriculture, Nutrition, and Food Systems launched by the Board for International Food and Agricultural Development (BIFAD) and USAID.

Daniela previously worked with International Development Enterprises (iDE UK) on projects focusing on market-based approaches to increase climate resilience of smallholder farmers in Africa and Asia. In her prior roles with consulting companies, she managed large international development projects.

She holds a MSc in Environmental Economics from the University of London as well as Master’s degree in Political Science from the University of Bucharest.