Tessa Macnad

Tessa Macnab is Senior Investment Manager at Removall, where she leads the origination, structuring and execution of investments in high-integrity Nature-Based Solutions across emerging and frontier markets. She focuses on investing in projects that combine carbon integrity with tangible co-benefits such as ecosystem restoration and resilient livelihoods, supporting Removall’s mission to accelerate ambitious net-zero and sustainable development strategies. Tessa brings over a decade of experience in development finance and impact investing, with a strong focus on Africa. She began her career in asset management at Allan Gray in South Africa before joining the Agence Française de Développement (AFD) in Johannesburg, where she worked on social sector and financial innovation initiatives in the region. She later moved to AFD headquarters in Paris, contributing to multi-sectoral programmes in frontier contexts, before becoming Senior Investment Officer at Proparco, the private sector financing arm of the AFD Group. At Proparco, she managed complex transactions of €10–150m across emerging markets, with a focus on Africa, covering climate finance, SME growth, agribusiness and sustainable value chains, financial inclusion, ESG integration, gender equality and diversity, with responsibilities spanning the full investment cycle from origination and due diligence to structuring, negotiation, closing and portfolio management. She holds a Master’s degree in Development Economics from Sciences Po Bordeaux and a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of Cape Town.