Senior Fellow at the Brazilian Center for International Relations (CEBRI). She's Brazil Representative at Nia Tero.

Former Coordinator of the Ford Foundation’s Alliance for Climate and Land Use in Brazil in Rio de Janeiro. Before joining CLUA, she led PADMA Environmental Consulting, a company she founded to work on the intersection of business and biodiversity conservation. Ms. Lerda also spent three years at Funbio where, among other responsibilities, she facilitated a network of 22 conservation trust funds on behalf of RedLAC, the Latin American Network of Environmental Trust Funds.

Prior to that, she was Grant Director for the Critical Ecosystems Partnership Fund, acting as a Program Officer for South America, responsible for overseeing grants to over 300 civil society organizations. She also served as Director of Conservation Outreach and Community Training at Conservation International and previously as Director of Global Communications and, early in her career, at the Inter-American Development Bank.

Daniela holds a bachelor’s degree in Humanities and Psychology from Royal Holloway University of London and a Masters in International Education and Ecology from George Washington University.