Jose Toasa
Jose Toasa, a native of Ecuador, founded Wilkes Investments (WI) in 2020 after a lifetime of living and working in Latin America. Jose moved to the U.S. from Ecuador in 2001 and began working in the international development sector on behalf of the U.S. government in 2007. During his tenure, he traveled to Latin America more than 80 times, primarily to remote agricultural regions of Guatemala, Belize, Panama, and Colombia. It was over the course of these trips that Jose developed extensive knowledge of the grassroots organizations based in the region, including the challenges they face accessing financial capital.
In 2018, Jose left the U.S. Government, and in 2019, he started providing affordable financing to two grassroots development organizations in Guatemala. These impact investments grew into what is now WI. Today, WI continues to expand and proudly invests in six grassroots organizations throughout the country.
Currently, Jose is the Chief Financial and Operations Officer at Wilkes Legal, LLC.