Our Team
Carlos Vazquez
I was born and raised in Madrid. I am an IT professional, and a private contributor to many NGO´s, such as Doctors without Borders, UNHCR, Greenpeace. Inspired by the amazing story of Virunga National Park, I visited the area, where I had direct experience of the situation in eastern Africa. Some months later I have founded Asociacion Tabaiba to support Fondazione Cariello Corbino’s projects and to show family and friends that dreams can come true.
The Utopian Dandelion Project is a way to express my commitment with sustainability, fair trade, development and people doing amazing stuff all around the world.
Lee Sims
I have been representing the Italian charity, Fondazione Cariello Corbino, here in the UK for a few years and more recently have become more heavily involved in the role of General Director. This journey has led to me having amazing experiences developing community based projects, in places such as Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda and Pakistan. The Community projects are all founded on us learning from the inspirational people around the world we work alongside, whilst doing whatever we can to provide opportunities for the communities to progress their dreams. Economic Empowerment is a real passion and the journey with the Fondazione Cariello Corbino has led me to meet my colleagues here at The Utopian Dandelion Project, Alberto, Miguel, Carlos and I have traveled and worked on projects together and have formed a deep rooted trust, friendship and passion for community opportunities, that we live out in this business journey together. We are truly dedicated to supporting colleagues in communities all over the world, our aim is to get their incredible stories told and heard and as a consequence work alongside them to grow their economic projects and provide opportunities to their communities.
Miguel Amortegui
Hello! I am one of the four Co-founders of the The Utopian Dandelion Project, and content creator for the Fondazione Cariello Corbino. I am a photojournalist / filmmaker. I use the visual mediums of film and photography to tell meaningful stories, often with a social conscience. I am also a trained participatory photography facilitator – building photography and digital storytelling skills within often disadvantaged or marginalised communities to enable individuals to represent themselves and create tools for advocacy and communication. This has included work with gangs in London, residents of Lima’s slums in Peru, and communities experiencing extreme poverty in Ghana. I have produced documentaries with exiled people around the world.
I have spent a very long time working with communities that have been in exiled, abused, or destroyed by war, famine, political regime or social and sexual discrimination. I lived in the infamous refugee camp in Calais, France, called the Jungle. Where I spent most of my time teaching refugees photography in order to give them a voice through social media platforms while at the same time writing a photography book called Voices of the Jungle. ( A compilations of stories of a refugee camp).
Alberto Corbino
Hello there, I am Italian, born and raised in the beautiful and complicated Napoli. For the last 30 years my work - and life philosophy - has been Sustainable Development and (real) Corporate Social Responsibility. I hold a Ph.D. in "Man and Environment" from the University of Padua and I have been teaching "good economy" at Italian and American Universities for over 15 years. Since the mid '90s, I have been devoting time and efforts to humanitarian projects, in Naples and abroad (Rwanda, Mexico, Brazil, Bosnia,...). My first visit to sub - Sharan Africa was in 2009, when I visited a small orphanage on the outskirts of Goma, in DRC. In 2017 I co-founded - and I since then lead - the charity Fondazione Cariello Corbino also know as EartHeart, to honour my mother's memory. EartHeart is today a major supporter of the "Gazelles de Silvana - Children and Community Centre" in Nord Kivu, DRC and of the "Women and Children With Albinism Uganda" association.
I decided to co-found The Utopian Dandelion Project, to prove that profit and humanity can walk hand in hand and for a very very long way.
