Anisha Rajapakse is a global professional working at the intersection of international development, human rights, and business, with experience spanning Africa, Asia, the Middle East, the Caribbean, and the Pacific regions. Anisha led the Human Development Programme at the Commonwealth for several years, with previous roles including acting as Director of Stakeholder Engagement at the Fair Labour Alliance, Senior Programme Consultant for Sustainability & Human Rights for Control Risks, and Development Communications Expert for Deutsche Gesellschaft Für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) in Afghanistan, among countless others.
Maria Mooraj: Would you like to speak about your background and provide some insight on your current role?
Anisha Rajapakse: I’m a British national of Sri Lankan origin. I studied in the UK and thereafter have been working globally in different parts of the world. My first degree was in Sociology, English, and Economics. My master’s was in International Studies with an emphasis on third world development, and I have a diploma in journalism and an Institut Européen d’Administration des Affaires (INSEAD) certification in Social Entrepreneurship. I work at the intersection of international development, business, and human rights. I am currently working on a pro bono basis on an initiative focused on ending gender-based violence (GBV) and sexual harassment in rural Rajasthan in India together with a leading female politician and a prominent cricket personality. This is a strategy to draw male attention to the issue of GBV. I believe the active engagement of men and boys to end GBV is critical because when it is only women speaking to women, it does little to move the dial in a positive way. Male allies and champions can amplify the issue and efforts to end GBV.
MM: Was there a particular motivation to pursue a career in international development?
AR: Being from Sri Lanka and having a global outlook, I could see the issue of poverty in developing countries to be a major deterrent to positive development all around me. From an early age, I wanted to do something to help poorer communities. That doesn’t mean I was aspiring to be a ‘Mother Teresa’ under any means, but that I wanted to use my skills to help marginalized and vulnerable communities. My parents always kept us grounded, so even though I was technically coming from a privileged background, I was never in a bubble. When you see beggars in the street and the real gulf between the rich and the poor, it moves you. I questioned what could be done to help narrow this gap, and I consciously chose to pursue an undergraduate degree that would take me toward the field of international development. I decided not to pursue a PhD until I added a few more years of field experience, and ultimately realized that being overqualified, particularly as a woman in this field, can be a disadvantage. I did not want to collect the “doctor” in front of my name just for the sake of it.
MM: Why do you think there are specific challenges to being overqualified?
AR: At the time, and even now, there aren’t many senior female experts in this area. I was relatively young because I went into my master’s immediately after my undergraduate degree. But I think more than having qualifications, the most important thing when getting into international development is having on-the-ground experience. Academic studies give you theoretical foundations, but that’s not enough; knowing the realities on the ground is far more effective than any PhD because you are experiencing the real-world applications of your studies.
MM: Do you think your multicultural background gives you a different perspective from other experts in the field and shapes your approach to development challenges?
AR: Yes, because these issues cannot be picked up from textbooks; the lived experience is what is really critical. Even after I did my master’s, I thought I would immediately land a big international job and hit the ground running, which was not the case. You have to learn to walk before you can run in this field. I worked extensively across Asia, Africa, the Caribbean, and the Pacific regions, and in some of the situations, I was thrown into the deep end. Sink or swim. And it was really good. I also think people on the ground relate to you better, and you can get more engagement from stakeholders when they know you’re not just someone who’s flown in without any knowledge of the situation they are in or has no understanding of the realities of living in a developing country and the issues that are constantly plaguing them. No amount of academic qualifications can make up for the lack of that experience.
MM: Could you elaborate on a project or two that you worked on that had a significant impact on a vulnerable group?
AR: While I was the Head of Human Development for the Commonwealth for four years, I had oversight of four regions. Since it was an intergovernmental body, I was the interface between the government and civil society and worked with local NGOs on critical issues. One of the main experiences I am proud of is setting up the civil society networks on HIV and AIDS in each region (Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, and the Pacific), where local organizations get together to combat the pandemic and provide treatment for those affected. It’s all about collective action; I truly believe in that. No entity can address and mitigate challenging issues on its own—whether government, civil society, or corporate. Bringing the people who are passionate about moving the dial on these issues is quite critical. Similarly, we worked a lot with the LGBTQ+ community. At the time, the acronym didn’t exist, but the fact that we were able to create platforms for the community to speak on issues at a time when it was illegal in most of the Commonwealth countries to be LGBTQ+ meant that their community didn’t get buried. I am also really passionate about the issue of gender equality. I work a lot with children, but we cannot focus on children’s issues without bringing in mothers. Why does child labor happen? Though, obviously, the causes are varied, most often child labor exists in situations of inherent poverty within the family. But if the woman is empowered, there is an alternate income stream.
In Bangladesh, I supported a leading apparel manufacturing company in developing a strategy to empower female workers in their supply chain at the factory floor level to be trained and promoted to managerial and supervisory roles. Previously, women were generally only confined to the machines on the factory floor level, and having male supervisors created a disconnect. I worked with this company to develop a business case for empowering women in the workplace. The initiative proved to be very successful, leading to reduced absenteeism and staff turnover. The profit margins also increased. Developing ways for companies to look at production through a human rights lens rather than just a “business as usual” lens is really important. From being strictly in philanthropy, I moved to working with businesses because they have resources and less bureaucracy, so you can support and guide them toward doing the right thing.
MM: Do you have any advice for a business that’s looking to integrate sustainable practices and human rights into their core strategies?
AR: It’s about ensuring sustainable supply chains and sustainability from a social and environmental perspective. Governance is important because there has to be buy-in from the top—otherwise, you can’t move the dial throughout the company. But what is important for businesses to understand is that it is about the people. You have to respect people’s rights in the workplace and in the hiring process. Businesses need to understand that the global landscape is changing hugely. Respecting the rights of your workers is critically important; you are accountable, especially if you are exporting to international markets with their human rights due diligence directives. I would say that businesses need to map their supply chains from beginning to end, and then you can identify the salient human rights risks. You need to do due diligence, and that means talking to stakeholders and workers. The first part of any supply chain is easy to identify as it is generally the direct suppliers, but where many human rights violations happen is further down the supply chains, in the second and third tiers. For businesses, feigning ignorance about human rights violations in their supply chains is no longer an excuse. All businesses need to make respect for human rights part of their corporate strategy. Today, we are living in a hyper-transparent world, where even a fisherman on a boat in Thailand has a smartphone to take pictures of what is really happening to them. Negative press and “naming and shaming” can get companies shut down. Luckily, that draws attention to previously hidden violations. Earlier, doing good was just a nice, voluntary thing to do. Now, it’s become mandatory.
MM: Would you be able to speak on the implications of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) funding changes on global supply chains?
AR: I think the biggest problem is that valuable work on the ground will be forced to stop. As a member of the Rainforest Alliance Board of Directors, I’ve seen firsthand how our USAID-supported programs provide an invaluable lifeline for countless farming and forest communities around the world. We would be turning the clock back in a very bad way. The recent funding freeze on nearly all US foreign aid has sent shockwaves through our critical work. The impact is enormous: The Rainforest Alliance alone lost $20 million in vital program funding overnight. We have luckily set up an Emergency Resilience Fund to somehow try to raise additional funds to save the valuable work, but how does a smaller NGO reliant on USAID pay salaries? At the end of the day, the implications are huge for people on the ground to whom these funds have been committed. It’s pressing an eject button without any prior warning. This reckless move puts lives, livelihoods, and our natural world on the line. I don’t know where this will go, but there are still international bodies and philanthropic foundations that I hope will be more active than ever. Obviously, it’s the American people’s money at the end of the day. This has been like just yanking the plug, which is really harmful and so shortsighted.
MM: In the face of volatility with funding being cut with no warning, do you think there are organizations that will step up?
AR: The rather positive development I see coming out of all this is that more organizations will partner. That would be good because, at the end of the day, the funding landscape globally is shrinking hugely, and everyone is vying for a piece of the pie, and you have to work really hard to get that piece. But right now, if there are organizations that are working for the same cause and the same target groups and so on, if they band together for the common cause, I think that more can be done. It’s difficult to say because it’s changing every day. I totally empathize and sympathize with these people who have lost their jobs and have had to just get on a flight and get out of that country because they don’t have a place anymore. The USAID website has been shut down, so there’s no access to history or important documentation that would have been useful. At the end of the day, the people on the ground will be the ones who don’t have anything at all—so many will die without the right vaccines and medications.
MM: You have mentioned a lot of pressing issues, both social and sustainable, that you’ve worked on. Often, as students, it’s difficult to understand what to prioritize given our limited resources and a limited ability to effect meaningful change. As people who are trying to be socially conscious, is there a prioritization you would suggest, or should we focus on issues that are meaningful to us?
AR: It’s a combination. I would say climate change and human rights. These are not separate issues; they are interconnected in many ways. In terms of climate change, there are studies and reports stating how dire the situation is. The science and evidence are clear. I think those are important because that’s what the next generation will be faced with, and we are already seeing so many manifestations. But climate change isn’t just about the signs of it, but, at its core, it’s about people. People come first, and people and planet go hand in hand. There can’t be one without the other. People are responsible for affecting negative climate activities, and it’s people’s lives that depend on these changes from having climate migrants and being faced with climate disasters. It’s devastating. Go with an organization that you feel is doing good stuff because walking the talk is really important. Your generation of students: They’re smart. They have an innate sixth sense to spot what is greenwashing or whitewashing. Be curious, ask questions, don’t go by the face value of your products. Be proactive: Find out where your clothes, your coffee, your tea, is coming from. Is it sustainably sourced, or does it come at the cost of the lives and livelihoods of smallholder farmers and communities on the ground? This should affect the decision-making that you all do because you all are the future, and your decisions and actions will have a huge impact.
MM: Is there a specific legacy that you hope to leave through your work in sustainability and human rights?
AR: I would like to have more women economically empowered and in charge of their lives to make effective decisions that impact their families and give their children a better education and future. In the same way, I hope I am able to positively influence businesses to be serious about doing the right thing, not just to tick a box or because someone’s holding a gun to your head or at the threat of being slammed with fines, but because it’s the right thing to do. I’ve been lucky with the companies I’ve worked with, as they have been genuine in their intent and efforts. I strongly believe in amplifying the voices of people on the ground, and have been trying to do that at each chance I get. Their voices need to be heard in offices, board rooms, national and international conferences, and so on. For many years, there’s been an overflow of people from rich countries speaking on what’s good for people from low- and middle-income countries. That has to change. I have also challenged and avoided invitations to participate in panel discussions that are 99 percent men. On principle, I do not accept invites to join a “manel,” which is what we call a panel that has only men, or one token woman, to discuss issues that impact women and development challenges in general—however prestigious the event. We are still not out of the woods, but I am hopeful. If I weren’t hopeful, I wouldn’t be in this line of work.
MM: What does it mean to you to be a successful woman in international sustainability efforts?
AR: I believe that sustainability has no gender, and is no more a trend or a business case. I feel that it’s an obligation and a lifestyle to preserve our world for future generations. Success to me is knowing and feeling that I’ve given it “my all,” and being resilient to face challenges whilst staying true to principles that keep me grounded to keep “fighting the good fight;” there’s no “what-if.” I have worked across regions for over two decades—primarily dedicated to social justice, rights-based issues—thus I have a broad, yet informed, perspective on the realities and what it takes to support the challenges facing people, businesses, and the planet. I always try to do things to make a positive impact.
MM: Do you have any advice for students looking to work in philanthropic or sustainable initiatives? Are there any misconceptions they should look out for?
AR: In discussions I have had with students over the years, many think that working for big international bodies is what a career in international development looks like, with the ultimate goal of working for the UN. But honestly, it doesn’t work that way. You need to get your feet dirty. The more countries, the more on-the-ground experience you have, the faster you will rise in this field. Academic qualifications don’t cut it. Learn a few new languages if possible. Start small and don’t expect big bucks when you start, because that will be for the wrong reasons. There has been a good movement in recent years where paid internships are becoming the norm. When I started off, there wasn’t anything like that. If you were an intern then, you basically got no remuneration. Young people have better opportunities today, which is really great. Another way is to find somebody that you can connect with to mentor you, so you can have guidance and expertise to help you navigate your way forward.
MM: Is there a piece of advice you’d like someone to take away from this interview?
AR: Trust your instincts and go with your gut. You do not need to go down a career path because you’re being pressured into doing it or because it’s in your family. Do it for the right reasons. A six-figure salary will not necessarily bring you joy and fulfillment, is all I can say. Know that down the road of international development, you rarely have the level of remuneration that you would have in the private sector, but you have to do what moves you. That’s what’s important.
*This interview has been edited for length and clarity.