Luca Renda: Resident Representative

Mr. Luca Renda is the UNDP Resident Representative in Sudan as of 25 April 2024. He comes from New York, where since 2020 he has served as Head of the Recovery Solutions and Human Mobility Team, at the UNDP Crisis Bureau.
Luca has over 25 years of experience working in a variety of development settings, in roles of increasing responsibilities since his first assignment with the United Nations as UN Volunteer in Liberia back in 1997. 

In UNDP, Luca has served as Program Manager in the Emergency Response Division (1999-2000) and Regional Bureau for Latin America and the Caribbean (2000-2004). He has been Deputy Resident Representative in Ecuador (2004-2007) and Honduras (2007-2012), and Country Director in Lebanon (2012-2017), where worked on the UN response to the Syrian crisis. 
Between 2017 and 2020, he has undertaken special assignments such as Head of the UN Crisis Management Unit in Dominica, coordinating UN and UNDP post-disaster recovery efforts; Resident Representative in Guyana; and Special Advisor for the UN transition in Haiti. 

Luca graduated in Political Science/International Relations at LUISS in 1994. He also holds a Master of Science in Development Studies from the London School of Economics. He is married with two children.

UNDP Sudan Senior Management

Thair Shraideh: Deputy Resident Representative (Operations)

Thair Shraideh is UNDP Sudan’s Deputy Resident Representative (Operations).

He leads the Operations Team encompassing procurement, finance, human resources, logistics, facilities management and security, towards smooth and safe operation of UNDP programming in Sudan.

Prior to Sudan, Thair served with ILO on secondment for two years as Coordinator and Chief Technical Advisor to the ILO’s Programme of Support to the Syrian Crisis in Jordan.

Thair joined UNDP in 2009 and served Iraq for 9 years in several roles as Programme Manager, Head of Basra Office and Deputy Country Director a.i. for Operations. He also served a detail assignment as Resident Advisor for Coordination and Early Recovery in Gaziantep, Turkey for supporting the Syrian crisis.

Prior to UNDP, Thair has long diversified experience in programme management, grants management, compliance, and operations working with international NGOs, UN agencies and the Public Diplomacy Section of U.S Embassy in Amman, Jordan. Through his career, he served national and regional programmes covering 10 Arab countries.

Thair has a BA in Economics and Accounting, and an MBA in Management from the New York Institute of Technology (NYIT).