Bea Varnai has had a cross-disciplinary education, having studied at SciencesPo Paris, University of Sao Paulo in Brazil, Colegio de Mexico, the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne and the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva. Passionate about community-led development and participatory approaches, she specializes in sustainable urban development, citizen participation, the social and financial engineering of urban projects, and multi-stakeholder consultation.Since 2013, Bea has worked on citizen initiatives, public policies, projects, and studies in a number of fields, including affordable housing, informal settlement and home upgrading, participatory urban planning and design, climate change adaptation in Africa (Senegal, Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast, Kenya), Central America (Nicaragua), South America (Peru, Brazil) and in Eastern and South-Eastern Europe.Before joining Urbaconsulting as a project manager in 2022, Bea developed her career in the non-profit sector where she worked closely with local communities (at urbaMonde and urbaSEN and the city network FMDV). In addition to her field experience, she has worked on case and feasibility studies, research & development projects, and publications, all in collaboration with academic and professional networks, local authorities, and grassroots alliances.

Clémence Foreau holds an engineering degree from Polytech Tours, where she specialised in urban planning and the environment. During her studies and first professional experiences, she focused on the urban issues facing developing countries.Before joining Urbaconsulting as a junior project manager in 2022, Clémence worked with French NGOs (Urbanistes Sans Frontières, ADESAF) and consulting firms, leading projects on improving living conditions in informal settlements, urban planning, access to basic public services, and assessing and reducing urban vulnerability in Africa (Senegal, Togo), Asia (India) and similar settings (Mayotte).Convinced that working in partnership with local stakeholders is vital for building a project that is adapted to the situation on the ground, and for enabling knowledge sharing, Clémence has become an expert in co-constructing projects through citizen engagement.As a result, Clémence possesses the knowledge and skills required to carry out sustainable, resilient and locally-tailored projects.

François Touchais has over 21 years of environmental law and water legislation experience. He has worked on a range of projects that focused on water resources, flooding, drought, drinking water and sanitation, waste, energy, climate change adaptation, coastal zones, and urbanism.As an expert, he has carried out numerous institutional and legal water supply and sanitation, and water resource management projects. He provides technical assistance, institutional and public policy evaluation, water law development and capacity-building services.He has coordinated a number of multimillion euro projects.Over the course of his career, François has worked with the International Office for Water, Umweltbundesamt (the Austrian environment agency) and the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission.He has also worked as a consultant for UNDP, UNICEF, UNECE and GIZ.

Charlotte Kalinowski is a public law and political science graduate specialising in the design and management of public services, mainly water, sanitation and solid waste. She joined Hydroconseil in 2015 after having spent several years working for the largest sanitation authority in Europe (SIAAP). Over the course of her 15 year career, Charlotte has conducted national sector studies, defined national policies and strategies, and led the implementation of a large number of projects to structure sanitation services (technical, institutional, financial and socio-economic feasibility studies; project preparation, monitoring and evaluation; research; facilitating consultation workshops; developing concession contracts, etc.). She has also provided technical assistance to project owners on structuring and implementing urban development projects. She has extensive experience of the economic and institutional issues specific to the water, sanitation and waste sectors, both in large and small cities and in rural areas. Charlotte has worked in Africa, the Middle East and south-east Asia. She is currently based in Lebanon where she coordinates Hydroconseil and Urbaconsulting activities.

Emma has a Master’s 2 degree in International Political Economy (University of Grenoble) and 14 years' experience of conducting economic analyses and managing projects in the basic services (drinking water, hygiene) and public health sectors (education and health promotion, social protection). Before joining Hydroconseil in 2016, Emma spent two-and-a-half years working in the diplomatic service, in the French embassies in Pakistan and Panama, and developed the ability to work effectively with all types of stakeholder (private, public, elected officials, associations, users). She also worked in the health and social protection sector for 5 years, where she acquired extensive prevention, behaviour change, service development and capacity-building expertise. Pro-active and good communicator, Emma is able to participate in both strategic discussions and practical implementation activities in the field. Since joining Hydroconseil, she has specialised in the economic and financial analysis of drinking water, sanitation and energy projects and services. She works in particular on the financial.

Benoit Paillet is an engineer who specialises in assessing, designing and monitoring the construction of water supply and sanitation systems. After graduating with a Master’s degree in Water Engineering in 2005, he applied and honed his knowledge and skills working for consulting firms, public water supply and sanitation utilities and international NGOs in Europe, Asia and Africa. Through his work preparing 46 master plans, Benoit developed an in-depth understanding of the practical challenges of rural and urban water supply and sanitation. In his subsequent position as head of a department managing an annual €7.5 million budget for improving water supply and sanitation networks, he worked with his team on planning, designing and implementing technical solutions to address these challenges. With a specific interest in optimising water supply network functionality, he has also overseen a range of Non-Revenue Water (NRW) and pressure management programmes. In addition to speaking French and English, Benoit is fluent in Portuguese, which he learnt while working in East Timor, Mozambique and Portugal. 

Since joining Hydroconseil in 2022, he has specialized in socio-economics analysis and financial studies of public services in Mali and Togo. In 2019, he worked as a Financial Response Data Analyst of iMMAP in Colombia. Camilo worked at PADF (Pan American Development Foundation) in the mobilization of resources for the humanitarian response to the crisis after the Haiti Earthquake in 2010. He also conducted socio-economic studies for cooperatives and communities in the Dominican Republic. In 2011 as a project assistant, Camilo worked in the formulation of urban projects for vulnerable populations in communities in the south of Bogota, Colombia.  As a UNDP National Technical Assistant in 2013, Camilo mobilized his expertise in the realization of participatory diagnoses, economic and financial analyses, evaluation of effects, results, and impacts for interventions (socio-economic projects, creation, improvement of collective infrastructures, productive projects, financial projections, performance analyses) of the UNDP Poverty Reduction Department in the whole Colombian territory. Thanks to his experience at the United Nations, he has a solid knowledge of the Sustainable Development Goals, especially those of poverty reduction, economic and financial development, decent work, and economic growth. 

A graduate of CERDI (International Development Research Centre) in Clermont-Ferrand (France), Marie specializes in development economics and project analysis. This selective master's degree provided her with the skills required to apply project management and analysis tools and applied research methodologies to development economics-related issues.Marie began her career working in a Colombian NGO, which enabled her to quickly familiarize herself with the Latin American context. She subsequently joined Hydroconseil, where she has been applying her socio-economic, institutional and statistical expertise to water and sanitation access improvement projects since 2019.Marie also specializes in conducting international-level evaluations of water, sanitation and hygiene projects/programmes. Having worked on evaluations for NGOs, as well as for large development agencies (UNESCO, UNICEF, AFD), she has experience of using a range of evaluation approaches, methodologies and tools, which she is able to adapt to a wide range of fields of study and contexts.Since July 2021, Marie has been based in Colombia, where she is working with Nexsom, notably providing technical assistance to AFD on water and risk management as part of the Euroclima+ programme being implemented across Latin America and the Caribbean. This is enabling her to build in-depth knowledge of the water and sanitation sector in several countries in Latin America and the Caribbean.

After graduating with a degree in political science, Lise-Ella continued her studies at Sciences Po Rennes - ENS Rennes, completing a Master's degree in Urban Services Engineering in Networks (ISUR), specialising in improving access to essential services in developing countries.Lise-Ella has been working as a water, sanitation and solid waste specialist and project manager since 2019. She has worked on a range of socio-economic studies, not only developing tools and methodologies, but also delivering training and analysing the qualitative and quantitative data collected. She has acquired an in-depth knowledge of participatory social engineering methods and is used to working with communities and informal sectors to develop access to essential services. Using her knowledge of public policies, she also conducts institutional and organisational assessments for local institutions (ministries, cities, operators, etc.). Finally, Lise-Ella adopts an inclusive and resilient development approach to each of the projects in which she is involved.Her project experience has led her to specialise in the solid waste sector, conducting waste characterisation studies (Caribbean and West Africa), supporting the creation or extension of pre-collection services in urban areas (Central Africa) and sharing lessons learned on women's practices in waste prevention, management and recovery (Maghreb).

With a dual Master's degree in Economics and Networked Urban Services Engineering (from IEP Rennes), Lola specialises in essential urban networks, project and business management.Lola graduated with a Bachelor's degree in Economics and Management from the Rennes 1 University’s Economic Sciences Faculty, where she acquired robust statistics, econometrics and survey analysis skills. As part of her Master's degree in project management, she was subsequently able to assist companies and projects using economic analysis tools and methods.For her second master's degree at the IEP in Rennes, she specialised in access to housing and essential services such as energy, water, sanitation, waste and mobility in developing countries. During this year of study, she prepared an expert report on drinking water, rainwater and sanitation in Conakry (Guinea).Within Hydroconseil, she is working as a junior energy expert. She has been involved in various projects, and has worked on preparing calls for tender and launching the group's new energy brand. Lola has also helped develop the report on rural and semi-urban households’ willingness-to-pay for the electricity service in Haiti.

In the last year of her Master’s degree at CERDI (Centre for Studies and Research on International Development), Laura specialised in development project analysis. During her studies at CERDI, she developed her knowledge and understanding of economic development issues, econometrics, statistics, financial analysis, survey techniques and the use of data processing programmes such as Stata.Laura has helped conduct financial analyses of water operators as part of projects to carry out feasibility studies and draft master plans. She has worked on producing water demand projections, and on analysing commercial data and financial models to forecast water operators’ short and medium-term financial situations. Her involvement in water and wastewater project evaluations at Hydroconseil has enabled her to further develop her project and programme evaluation skills.

Garance holds a master's degree in development economics from the Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches sur le Développement International (CERDI), part of the Clermont-Ferrand School of Economics, and she specialises in official development assistance project analysis and management. After two years studying at the ENS D2 grandes écoles preparatory class in Bordeaux, Garance turned her focus to the socio-economic development sector in developing countries. Through her studies, Garance has developed sound project management and analysis skills, built an in-depth knowledge of the economic, social, political and environmental challenges of development, and mastered the use of quantitative and qualitative analysis and survey technical tools. Her experience working as WO.MEN.STRUATION project manager for the non-profit organization Afric'Avenir raised her awareness of the difficulties people face in accessing water and hygiene facilities in developing countries and motivated her to join Hydroconseil in 2023. At Hydroconseil, Garance works on setting up and managing projects to provide access to essential public services, and she also provides economic and institutional analysis expertise.