Daniela (Dana) Buzducea
For more than 25 years Dana has worked to change the systems that keep some of the world’s most vulnerable children living in degrading, de-humanising conditions. Graduating in the first generation of Romanian social workers after the fall of the communist regime, Dana started her career working with HIV-infected children, and at-risk families to prevent child abuse, neglect and abandonment to institutions.
She led various national coalitions of NGOs working on children’s rights, the protection of people with disabilities and poverty reduction, and had served in several international consultations on improving the national systems for human capital development. In the nine years Dana worked with USAID in Romania, she contributed to de-institutionalisation, the development of community-based services, and mainstreaming education solutions for vulnerable children. As a National Director of World Vision Romania, Dana focused on increasing World Vision's visibility, programme quality and sustainability. In her current role as World Vision International’s Partnership Leader for Advocacy and External Engagement, Dana leads the organisation’s work to advocate for an end to violence against children, for strong child sensitive social protection policies and investments by governments and multilaterals, and towards the fulfilment of the SDGs and the Convention on the Rights of Children.
Dana is a passionate advocate for children’s right to participate, and to help shift the lack of political will or leadership. “It is our duty as adults to keep children high on the political and the public agenda so that no child is left behind in the development race, assuming full responsibility for our legacy to the next generation.”
Dana serves on the WVIRE Governance and Selection Committee.