IQ-EQ: Thought Leadership event in the Netherlands

Jacqueline van den Ende is co-founder of Amsterdam based climate fintech company Carbon Equity. Carbon Equity is a climate VC and PE fund investing fintech platform.

Carbon Equity was founded with the mission to unlock retail capital at scale to power breakthrough climate technologies whilst enabling more equitable ownership.

Jacqueline brings a unique perspective as a founder turned investor turned founder, twice over. She worked as a private equity investor at HAL Investments and more recently as a general partner at Venture Capital fund Peak Capital. She spent the other half of her career to date building and leading companies, including De Kleine Consultant, Rocket Internet backed online real estate marketplace Lamudi in South East Asia and Ant Financial backed Fintech scale up TrueMoney.

Jacqueline is obsessed with the question of how we can leverage capital most effectively to mitigate climate change. In addition to her role as founder and CEO of Carbon Equity she serves on the board of the Dutch last mile delivery scale-up Trunkrs.

Jacqueline obtained an MSc degree in Economics from the Erasmus University in Rotterdam and a BA in Social Sciences from University College Utrecht.

Ben Zwinkels grew up in agricultural family in the West of the Netherlands and has more than forty years of experience in banking and business development in Africa. After horticultural secondary education and working at the family horticulture business, Ben studied Accountancy and Business Administration in the evening hours for more than 7 years. After working for Stork Industries, Ben first went to live in Africa during the seventies and worked for cooperative banking in Cameroon and promoting SME’s in Tunisia. While living in Cameroon Ben fell in love with the continent. In 1982 Ben started his carrier at FMO, the Dutch Development Bank and developed a great experience in finance while travelling to 62 countries during more than 30 years of employment for FMO. Ben realised for FMO many investment transactions in more than 40 banks and 35 investments funds. While working for FMO, Ben became an authority of Private Equity in Africa and initiated the African Venture Capital Association as also the reviving of the NABC (Netherlands Africa Business Council). After retiring from FMO, Ben Chairman of the Board of AfricInvest and continued his respective Board Memberships within the Group Bank of Africa and the Group First Afriland Group. These two groups cover banking activities in more than 25 African countries. Ben combines these board positions with further Board Memberships in some Private Equity Funds in Vietnam and Mauritius. In his capacity of Chairman of the Board for AfricInvest, Ben remains active in the financial sector of Africa. Finally Ben’s motto has always been: Your limitation lies in your imagination!

Rosmarijn Fens is a true globe-trotter; she has worked in 3 different continents and 7 different countries in the last 20 years. She has worn many hats in her career and enjoys multi-disciplinary projects with many stakeholders. Her professional value boils down to her unique mix of work experience in all three sectors; public, private & non-profit.

Rosmarijn started her career as a management consultant with Arthur Andersen where she worked in both Curacao and Buenos Aires. In Miami she joined the Consulate-General of the Netherlands as senior economic officer where she was responsible for promoting and facilitating Dutch export and Dutch direct investment in the South-Eastern USA. In Singapore she worked as an advisor for water & the environment for the Embassy of the Netherlands.

She organised a successful study trip for the Singaporean Minister of the Environment and Water Resources and his delegation to the Netherlands to showcase the Dutch expertise in the field of water technology and delta technology. Besides that, she was responsible for the coordination of a productive Dutch participation at the Singapore International water Week 2012.

In 2015 she decided to add the non-profit sector to her experience and she joined WaterAid in London, the largest non-profit organization that focuses on the three essentials that transform people’s lives: water, sanitation and hygiene.  Rosmarijn was part of the Corporate Partnership team of WaterAid and she joined the WaterAid Speaker Network.

At NABC, Rosmarijn has been in charge of organising our flagship event Africa Works!, a thematic business conference organised to position, promote and market the African continent as a valuable trade and investment destination.  Africa Works! 2019 presented the theme of Future African Cities and welcomed over 600 participants and 12 African delegations. The conference featured 13 keynote speakers, 2 high-level Round Tables and 25 inspiring workshops about themes related to urbanization challenges African growing cities are facing.

Rosmarijn Fens was appointed as the new Managing Director of NABC in late 2020 and started her new position in January 2021. Rosmarijn speaks many languages and enjoys travelling. Her life credo is “don’t call it a dream, call it a plan!”

Theo Van Der Veen has been involved in the fresh produce trading and distribution in the Netherlands since the ‘80s. Starting at Van Huystee’s Holland House in Leeuwarden, a key trading company in FMCG and perishables worldwide, Theo then pursued his career at various leading positions in the Dutch fresh produce exporters and Southern hemisphere producers in worldwide sales to distributors, food service and retailers. Theo brings a raft of experience in this industry that particularly adds value to the of the commodity flows from all the farm operators. Theo is also responsible for the relationship management with agricultural operators. He is keen in visualizing and developing long term sustainable (potential) partnerships in the agri value chain at the African continent driven by embedded impact based on commercial scale developments now and in the future.

Sandrine Henton is the managing director at EG Capital based in Nairobi, Kenya.

EG Capital is investing in high growth businesses within the Food, Climate, Health and Education sectors in East Africa and Zambia. EG Capital is a member of AVCA, and the Global Private Capital Association (formerly EMPEA).

Sandrine has over a 15 years of professional experience in strategy consulting and finance, including private equity for businesses in emerging markets. She holds an MSc in International Business from Maastricht University, and was part of the inaugural class of the Oxford Impact Investing Programme at Said Business School.