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Gustavo Castagnino

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Gustavo Castagnino, director de Asuntos Corporativos y Sustentabilidad de Genneia y presidente del GDFE.

Gustavo Castagnino is director of Corporate, Regulatory and Sustainability Affairs at Genneia and president of the Group of Foundations and Companies (GDFE). With a career that combines corporate communication, public affairs and sustainability, he has positioned himself as a reference in the ESG agenda, sustainable finance and private social investment in Argentina.

From public service to corporate communication

Gustavo Castagnino built his career in a less-traveled field: the one that connects communication, public affairs and sustainability within large companies. He holds a degree in International Relations from Universidad del Salvador and added postgraduate studies at Universidad Austral, Universidad de San Andrés, ITBA and Digital House. His first professional steps took place in the State, with roles at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Economy, an experience that gave him, from the outset, a sharp reading of how public policy and the private world intersect.

Fourteen years at Mercedes-Benz

The bulk of his corporate training took place at Mercedes-Benz Argentina, where he worked for nearly fourteen years as director of Institutional Relations. From that position, he managed the automaker’s internal and external communications, public affairs and sustainability agenda. It was also there that he came into contact with the Group of Foundations and Companies, the organization he would end up chairing years later. That path turned him into a specialist in reputation and in the relationship between companies and their stakeholders.

The move into renewable energy

In August 2019, he joined Genneia, the country’s leading renewable energy generation company, as director of Corporate, Regulatory and Sustainability Affairs. His role covers communications, brand image, public and regulatory affairs and the firm’s entire ESG strategy. He also represents the company before sector chambers and associations: he was vice president of the Argentine Wind Chamber and sits on the committees of entities such as the UIA, AmCham and binational chambers. In practice, he is one of Genneia’s visible faces before the business and political ecosystem.

Sustainable finance and green bonds

One of the chapters Castagnino most strongly promotes is sustainable finance. From Genneia, he helped create a Public Good Finance table together with companies such as Plaza Logística, Beccar Varela, Comafi and Supervielle, a space that brings together banks, law firms and companies to finance social and environmental projects through green, social and sustainable bonds. The logic is concrete: to bring civil society organizations closer to market instruments that had previously seemed distant, with cases such as Pro Mujer, which issued bonds to finance microcredits for women entrepreneurs across the country.

At the head of GDFE: business placed at the service of the public

In 2024, he became president of the Group of Foundations and Companies (GDFE), a nonprofit civil association founded in 1995 that brings together around 80 foundations and companies dedicated to private social investment. From that position, he works to professionalize the way the private sector invests in public causes, with a focus on collaborative action among companies, the State and civil society. He promotes initiatives such as a public-private laboratory deployed in cities including Bahía Blanca, Godoy Cruz, San Juan, Puerto San Julián and Tandil, and an education table that brings together dozens of members around literacy and early childhood. That role best shows his influence beyond a single company.

A voice in the energy sector

Castagnino has also become a frequent interlocutor in debates over Argentina’s energy matrix. He often points out that the main bottleneck for renewables is not generation but transmission capacity, insists that mining needs clean energy to meet environmental standards and places green hydrogen and higher electricity consumption linked to artificial intelligence among the trends that will redefine the business. His view combines the defense of the renewable business with a social impact agenda, the mark that runs through his entire career.