David Smith’s Biography
I'm an American who has lived in Moldova for the last 11 years and regularly writes about Moldovan politics and economics. I author a newsletter on substack called Moldova Matters and am a freelance contribute to Euractiv covering Moldova.
A fuller biography is below:
I grew up in Virginia and joined the Peace Corps after graduating with a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Georgia Tech. Peace Corps sent me to Kazakhstan where I spent most of 2011 before the organization was forced to evacuate from the country. After Kazakhstan I continued my service in Peace Corps Moldova from 2012 to 2014 where I worked in Community and Small Business development.
Following my Peace Corps service I stuck around Moldova and opened Chisinau’s first BBQ and Craft Beer pub called Smokehouse. We quickly made a name for ourselves not only because of the new food and craft beer, but because my co-founders and I set out to build and run a business without paying bribes or engaging in corruption. This proved to be rather challenging. In spite of an early attempt to deport us, and numerous (often very public) fights with corrupt officials, as well as dealing with bewildering bureaucracy, we managed to open and run the business without compromising our values.
In 2016, after realizing how challenging it was to run any company in Moldova, much less one that was honest, I co-founded the Moldova Small Enterprise Alliance or AIM. AIM is Moldova’s first and largest cross-sectoral association for SMEs. As the President of AIM, I work with our amazing team to advocate for policies that push back on the systemic causes of corruption and support modernizing the Moldovan business environment.
All this summary is just to highlight the perspective I bring to Moldova Matters and to my writing about Moldova. Through Peace Corps I’ve worked at a center for homeless children and within a local mayor’s office. I’ve traveled all over Moldova and have come to love and respect what was until recently a fairly quiet little piece of the world. I’ve seen corruption and stifling bureaucracy first hand. I’ve also seen an explosion of new businesses, civil society movements and new ideas over the last 11 years. For such a small country, Moldova is a vibrant and complicated place.