María Fernanda is the editor-in-chief of La Voz de Guanacaste, a local and alt-monthly newspaper located on the Pacific coast of Costa Rica. Along with a group of talented journalists, she has developed in-depth investigations on issues related to water scarcity, gender violence, local government corruption, refugees and how big companies use tax havens to hide their profits from the government. For this last investigation, she was among more than 300 journalists who dug into the Panama and Paradise Papers databases. She’s 2018 Professional Fellow from Latin America with International Center for Journalists and a 2018 TEDx Women speaker in Costa Rica. She recently won the National Institute for Women prize for journalists.
She started her career in 2010 working for the biggest media group in Costa Rica. She also wrote for a women-focused magazine where she investigated deep gender-equality stories and for a financial newspaper.