About

A legal management executive with 16 years of experience in commercial law, Mónica Durán has spent the last ten years in the hydrocarbon and chemical industry developing start-up companies, leading corporate governance implementation plans and conducting comprehensive legal management of companies in their pre-operational and early operational stages. Currently functioning as legal director of Yara, a global fertiliser company, Durán oversees the legal function of the company in the entire Latin America region, with the exception of Brazil, and is in charge of a legal team of eight employees. The operation of Yara in Latin America is the product of an acquisition of a holding group. Starting in her role two years ago, Durán has established the legal function in this new entity, building a successful team and setting up all processes and procedures covering 10 countries. She structured the legal team separating the roles of lawyers according to the business lines present in the company: Industrial, Crop Nutrition and Production. Prior to joining Yara, Durán worked at Pacific Infrastructure Ventures (2013-2015) as head of the legal department. Among a plethora of impressive achievements and noteworthy projects, Durán’s involvement on two major projects stands out: namely ‘Puerto Bahia’, a large scale port for the export and import of hydrocarbons in the Cartagena Bay, and ‘Olecar’, a 130 km pipeline connecting Puerto Bahia with the national network of pipelines and the Cartagena Refinery, with the estimated cost of both projects reaching $1bn. Between 2008 and 2013, Durán worked as legal coordinator at Oleoducto de los Llanos Orientales, an organisation established to construct the Rubiales-Monterrey pipeline in Colombia. There she led the project finance legal structure of the 235 km pipeline connecting Campo Rubiales to the Monterrey Station owned by Ecopetrol and the Pipeline Ocensa in Campo Cusiana. Prior to that Durán worked in a variety of positions, including legal coordinator as senior lawyer at Meta Petroleum (2007-2008), associate at Santos Munevar & Jaramillo (2001-2007) and junior lawyer at Rodriguez-Azuero (2000-2001).