Dr. Martin Burt, Founder & CEO of Fundación Paraguaya

Dr. Martin Burt is a world-renowned social entrepreneur who has developed and implemented various anti-poverty and educational social innovations. He is the creator of the Poverty Stoplight, a unique multidimensional poverty measurement tool and coaching methodology, which has been implemented in over 59 countries with 1,000 partners to eliminate poverty. He is the founder (1985) and CEO of Fundación Paraguaya, a social enterprise named Latin America’s most impactful and innovative development organization by the Inter-American Development Bank in 2018. 

Dr. Burt is co-founder and current board member of the Bertoni Nature Conservancy Foundation in Paraguay and Teach A Man to Fish in the UK. In public service, he has served as Chief of Staff to the President of Paraguay, was elected Mayor of the capital city of Paraguay, Asunción, and was appointed Vice Minister of Commerce. Dr. Burt has written books on economics, development, municipal government, poetry, and education. His latest books are “Paraguay sin Pobreza: Manual Práctico, Paso a Paso” (2023) and “Who Owns Poverty?” (2019). 

He holds a PhD from Tulane University in Development Economics and International Development, and is a Distinguished Visiting Professor of Entrepreneurship and Social Innovation at Worcester Polytechnic Institute and Research Associate at the University of California, Irvine. Dr. Burt has received awards from organizations including Avina Foundation, Skoll Foundation, Schwab Foundation, Synergos, Eisenhower Fellowship, Inter-American Development Bank, World Innovation Summit for Education, and Nestlé. He has spoken at events such as SOCAP, World Economic Forum, and TEDX, and has been featured in the New York Times, Forbes, and ABC.