Foreign Affairs Cabinet Secretary, Raychelle Omamo is exiting President Uhuru Kenyatta's cabinet after nine years of reign.

She was first appointed to the Cabinet serving as a Minister for Defence and  Chairperson of the Defence Council between April, 2013 and January, 2020.

Ambassador Omamo has on Tuesday, July 5, nominated by President Uhuru Kenyatta for the position of President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD).

Omamo will be facing off with Shobhana Kumar Pattanayak of India, Khaled A. Mahdi of Kuwait and Alvaro Lario of Spain.

Alvaro Lario is Associate Vice-President, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Controller, Financial Operations Department, at IFAD. 

He is part of the Executive Management Committee and is responsible for the design and implementation of the financial strategies and policies at IFAD, including oversight of the Treasury, Controller and Financial Management divisions.

Ambassador Omamo is a lawyer by profession having received her training at the University of Kent at Canterbury in the United Kingdom and at the Kenya School of Law.

She is a Senior Counsel and as a practitioner she was elected as a first female chairperson of the Law Society of Kenya from 2001 to 2003.

IFAD manages 18 agricultural programmes in Kenya and has spent Ksh.39.7 billion in the country since 1979.

In Kenya, IFAD loans provide support to smallholders and value chain actors including among others agro-dealers, private extension services, small traders, processors, in the dairy sector and cereal value chains. 

They also improve access to rural financial services.

In the past, IFAD activities concentrated on rural areas with medium to high productive potential, where most of Kenya's poor people live. 

In her capacity as a diplomat, Omamo was privileged to represent Kenya as her Ambassador to France with accreditation to Spain, Portugal, the Holy Sea and Serbia.

She has also been a Permanent Representative to UNESCO during the period 2003 and 2009.