Pilar Fernandez

Pilar serves as Minister Counselor at the Embassy of Colombia, focusing primarily on economic, energy and education affairs. In this capacity, she maintains a permanent dialogue with U.S. government agencies and the business community to advance the bilateral agenda and facilitate economic relations between Colombia and the United States. She also focuses her efforts on encouraging educational exchanges, building relationships between universities in Colombia and the U.S, and promoting a better knowledge of Colombia among the private sector and academic community.

Before joining the Embassy, she worked for five years as economic advisor to the CEO of the Colombian Coffee Growers Federation, a non-profit organization that works to improve the quality of life of over 500 thousand Colombian coffee growers. Previously, she served as technical advisor at the Regulatory Commission for Water and Basic Sanitation Services (CRA), the Colombian government agency in charge of regulating potable water distribution, sewage and waste management services.

She was born in Barranquilla, Colombia. She holds a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in Economics from University of Los Andes (Bogota, Colombia), as well as an MBA from Georgetown University.