PRIF Coordination Office
The PRIF Coordination Office is hosted by the Asian Development Bank’s Pacific Liaison and Coordination Office based in Sydney. The key role of the Coordination Office is to manage PRIF’s work program, including the facilitation of PRIF partner coordination activities, and to oversee and manage PRIF’s TA program.
Robert is an expert on infrastructure investment for social and economic development. He holds degrees in civil engineering, public administration, urban and regional planning, and international development and began his career as an engineer in the United States prior to working extensively for bilateral and multilateral agencies in international development. He has advised governments, the private sector, and multilateral institutions in over two dozen countries in Asia, the Pacific, and Latin America.
Prior to joining PRIF, Robert was with the Asian Development Bank since 2003 where he served as Chief Sector Officer; Director for Transport for East Asia; Director for Transport, Energy, and Natural Resources for the Pacific; and Transport Specialist for the Pacific. He spent four years as the Economic Infrastructure Adviser at the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat in Fiji and served two years as a volunteer in the Solomon Islands.
Katherine has over 15 years of experience working in infrastructure development and coordination in the Pacific including over 10 years supporting the World Bank’s urban resilience unit as a climate change and disaster risk management consultant. Her work has focused on supporting the delivery of the Pacific Resilience Program, covering a series of projects in Tonga, Samoa, and the Republic of the Marshall Islands, as well as regional projects led by SPC and PIFS. She was part of the World Bank team which delivered the Fiji Climate Vulnerability Assessment report launched at COP23 and provided the climate resilience inputs into the Blue Transformation for Pacific Maritime Transport report in 2023. She has also worked for the World Bank’s energy team and lived in Tonga, helping to deliver the Tonga Energy Roadmap project. Katherine is passionate about bringing people together, sharing knowledge and building capacity to deliver projects with even greater success.
Jane has over 20 years’ research and practical experience in project management in areas, such as sustainable transport solution to climate change, transport policy and planning and climate financing and renewable energy. As a practitioner, Jane has also held structural and transport engineering positions designing and supervising construction work. As an international consultant she has extensive experience working with various donors and government throughout Asia and Africa and the Pacific in the area of sustainable transport, climate financing and renewable energy.
Caroline has over 25 years' experience in international development cooperation, aid management and development effectiveness. As a development practitioner, Caroline held advisory positions with the Pacific Community (SPC) developing country programmes for SPC and its Pacific member countries. Prior to joining SPC, Caroline’s experience included public sector management and advising Tonga’s Finance Minister on the implementation of the public sector reform programme. She was also the Government of Tonga’s Director of Planning responsible for aid coordination and national development planning.
Nina has more than 30 years’ experience in development consultancy in the areas of project management, administration and finance in the infrastructure, health, agriculture and forestry, business/private sector development, and finance and economics sectors. The PRIF regional TA is Nina’s fourth regional assignment with the Asian Development Bank and has given her the opportunity to work in Kiribati, Tonga and Vanuatu.
Jim is an economic practitioner with almost 30 years of postgraduate experience. A major focus of his work is developing business cases for infrastructure projects including service need and demand assessments, economic assessments, and financial assessments. In recent years Jim has also been focusing on integrating climate risks and adaptation into infrastructure decision-making and investment across water, urban development, transport, waste management and energy infrastructure projects and portfolios.
From 2006 to 2024, Jim was an economic consultant and had undertaken over 300 consulting assignments including in Tuvalu, Samoa, Papua New Guinea, Fiji, Federated States of Micronesia, China, Vietnam, Myanmar, and for multinational organizations. Before commencing his consulting career in 2006, Jim was the Director of Economics for the Department of Natural Resources in Queensland Australia.
He is passionate about ensuring that resources available for infrastructure are channeled into projects that make a material difference in the lives of communities and underpin economic development.
Kylie is a monitoring and evaluation expert with over 20 years of experience implementing, managing and evaluating international development and resilience programming in the Pacific and South Asia. Before joining PRIF, Kylie was with the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs working with design and reporting for Pacific regional development strategies and programmes. She is passionate about advancing locally-developed solutions to regional challenges. She draws on her post-graduate qualifications in international and community development, participatory program management, and communication to support inclusion in assessing and improving program impact.
Meapelo has over 20 years of experience as an environmental planner, working with multiple Pacific island countries and development partners to support and promote environmental and social sustainability in planning for resilient infrastructure across the Pacific. He is passionate about building regional and national capacities of institutions and local communities to apply best practices in environmental and social safeguards to achieve the best outcome for the environment and people.