portrait Sandra Kassab 2024

KASSAB Sandra

Director, Africa Department at AFD
Expertise
Géographies : Africain continent
Region(s)

Overview

As head of the Africa department, Sandra Kassab oversees the activities and regional strategy of the AFD on the African continent, which represents 43% of its overall volume, through projects currently being carried out in 44 countries.

Sandra Kassab was appointed Director of the Africa Department in January 2025. Previously, she was Deputy Director of the Eastern Europe, Middle East and Asia Department during two years and a half.

From 2018 to 2022, Sandra Kassab was Country Director for the Agence Française de Développement (AFD) office in the Dominican Republic. Prior to this function, from 2014 to 2018, she was Senior Project Manager in charge of the Energy, Health and Social Protection sectors, based in the AFD Cairo office, in Egypt.

With over twenty years of experience at AFD, she has participated in the structuring of numerous development and financing projects in various sectors (in particular in infrastructure and energy, financial and social sectors) and several countries and continents.

Before joining AFD in 2006, Sandra Kassab worked for several international development organizations, such as the World Bank based in Port-au-Prince (Haiti) in 2005 in order to elaborate the intervention strategy of the World Bank in Haiti and the African Bank of Development. Moreover, Sandra Kassab published several articles and participated at various seminars on the theme of sustainable development.

Trained as a lawyer, Sandra Kassab holds a Master in International Law from the University of Paris I – La Sorbonne.