Adriana Jimenez is grants manager at the Surdna Foundation and also serves on the board of directors of the Grants Managers Network. This post was first published on Transparency Talk, a project of the Foundation Center.
The Panama Canal expansion project opened last June following several delays and controversies. It was a risky bet with promising outcomes.
While the expansion aimed to improve global trade by doubling the canal’s capacity, it now runs the risk of failure from faulty design. The project was wrought with conflicts of interest, imprecise data, and dubious processes; its stakeholders consider critiques of the canal “unpatriotic,” reluctant to learn from mistakes.