Veronica De Allende, Ph.D.

Veronica De Allende is an expert in international and development economics, with 15 years of experience as a U.S. Department of Defense operations research scientist. Recently, she was Women, Peace and Security (WPS) Advisor at the Office of the Secretary of Defense, Policy, Stability and Humanitarian Affairs and at the Defense Security Cooperation Agency. She has extensive in-country research fieldwork experience in Latin America, the Caribbean, West Africa and Southeast Asia, conducting root-cause research analysis and providing policy advice to high-level government and military officials. Her areas of expertise include foreign security assistance, security cooperation, humanitarian assistance and disaster-response preparedness, organizational analysis, and assessment, monitoring and evaluation (AM&E).

Prior to joining CNA,  De Allende was a consultant for the World Bank's Latin American Financial Sector Development Department on gender and micro-finance issues, and she was also the deputy economic advisor to the Mexican minister of trade. She has taught master's courses on economic development and managerial economics at Georgetown University and American University. She is a Fulbright scholar and holds a Ph.D. and Master of Arts in economics from Ohio State University and a Bachelor of Arts in economics from Universidad de las Americas, Mexico. A native Spanish speaker,  De Allende also speaks French.