Pradeep KURUKULASURIYA

Pradeep Kurukulasuriya is the Executive Secretary of the United Nations Capital Development Fund. He is a Sri Lankan economist with a PhD from Yale University in the United States. 

Prior to joining UNCDF, Pradeep was the Executive Coordinator of Environment Finance at UNDP where he oversaw a US$ 5 billion environment, climate and energy portfolio across 140 countries and provided strategic leadership of partnerships with the multilateral environment and climate funds, as well as with the private sector, development banks, and private equity funds related to climate finance. 

From 2019-2023, Pradeep led UNDP’s Nature, Climate, and Energy Practice, with 300+ personnel across headquarters and 5 Regional Hubs. Previously, he led the development and oversight of UNDP’s Climate Change Adaptation portfolio, and as the senior technical lead in the Global Environmental Finance team from 2010-2018, he played a key role in the trebling of UNDP's resource mobilization efforts for nature, climate and energy. 

Prior to joining UNDP in 2006, he worked with the World Bank and an NGO in Sri Lanka.