Maria Perdomo became UNCDF's Regional Coordinator for Asia in 2021 and brought with her 15 years of experience working with public and private sector stakeholders to bring finance to the most excluded in the Least Developed Countries across the globe. In her previous role as UNCDF's Youth Finance Lead, Maria brought access to financial services to close to 1,000,000 youth, of which 60% are young women and girls, unlocking almost US40M in loans for youth from domestic sources in Sub-Saharan Africa.

A national from Colombia, before joining UNCDF in 2010, Maria worked in the private sector developing client-centric financial services, building financial capabilities for migrants in New York City and providing technical assistance to financial services providers in Peru, Bolivia, India, Mali, Burkina Faso, and Uganda.  

sMaria has a master's degree in International Affairs from Columbia University's School of Public and International Affairs (SIPA), and a bachelor's degree from Universidad Externado de Colombia and l'Institut de Sciences Politiques de Paris (Sciences-Po). She is fluent in Spanish, English and French; and has advanced conversational skills in Italian.