Marcel Jacobo Laniado de Wind

Marcel Jacobo Laniado de Wind (June 4, 1927 – August 8, 1998) was an Ecuadorian agricultural engineer and banker who held a number of important public and private positions in Ecuador.

He was a humanist, and a public figure in Ecuador for his efforts to improve the country.

Marcel Jacobo Laniado de Wind was born on June 4, 1927, in Guayaquil, Ecuador.

His father, Maurice Jacob Laniado Hassig, was born in French Algeria, and had both Jewish roots and roots in Haifa in Palestine (of the Ottoman Empire).

Laniado Hassig emigrated to Ecuador via Manaus, Brazil, and began living in a Jewish community in Quito.

There Laniado Hassig met and married Fredika Wind Davila, a Dutch-Jewish woman who was born in Quito.

Fredika Wind Davila's father was Maurice de Wind, a Dutch Jew, and her mother was Mercedes Davila Peñaherera of Quito.

Laniado Hassig started his career as a dealer and mechanic.

He and his wife later moved to Ancon, a small city in the Guayas Province, where the British oil company Anglo Ecuadorian Oilfields Limited established its camp for all its personnel.

According to Marcel Laniado de Wind, his father moved to the camp for protection against the epidemics sweeping Ecuador, as at the time Ancon was an island of development and health.

There Laniado Hassig established the only hotel managed by a non-native, and also opened a small general store.

Laniado Hassig soon pursued trading in the South border town Santa Rosa, El Oro Province, despite the wishes of his wife.

He began importing textiles and livestock.

At this time, three of his four children were born.

Marcel was born in 1927, Cecilia was born in 1928, Marta was born 1930, and Rodrigo was born 1933.

Marcel Laniado de Wind attended elementary school at the camp in Anco, and later boarded at La Salle School in Quito, where he completed secondary studies.

In 1941, at age 14, Marcel Jacobo Laniado de Wind and his family were forced to seek refuge in Zaruma in the Province of El Oro during the Peruvian invasion of Ecuador, the family lost its home and belongings.

After the invasion Hassig and family moved momentarily to Guayaquil, and then to Machala in the El Oro Province where they started from scratch.

In Machala, his father began making iron components for ice makers and gasoline pumps, and put together an ice maker factory and a gas station as a distributor for the British company Anglo Ecuadorian Oilfields, and managed to save enough to educate the children, chiefly in culture and Jewish tradition.

After the war, his mother Wind Fredika of Laniado had to recreate personal documents and re-obtain a passport.

She changed her name to Harriet instead of Fredika and was affectionately called "Rica".

Laniado de Wind's status as a child of immigrants, with a name that few locals could pronounce, framed him as an outsider.

He admired the positive qualities of the social and economic elites in Ecuador, but observed vices and defects that created inequality and impeded the country's progress.

He completed undergraduate studies at the Pan American Agricultural School at El Zamorano, Honduras, where he graduated in 1949 with a degree in agronomy.

That year he returned to Machala.

His father died a few months later, and at 22 years old he became head of the household and the family business.

He helped care for his young siblings and helped educate Cecil in the United States and Rodrigo in Chile.

At 30 years old, in 1957, he became president of the Machala Rotary Club, and spearheaded paving the first three streets in the city after raising money from the Municipality and the Development Bank.

According to de Wind, "That made the machaleños think I could be a good mayor."

He decided to run for office, and his win was considered an upset to the political order of the time, which was dominated by families with tight political and economic control of the region.

As mayor of Machala, he depoliticized fiscal and municipal actions, and focused on infrastructure for drinking water, telephone communications, and wastewater management.

The Province of El Oro was isolated from the rest of Ecuador many years after the Peruvian invasion in fear of a new invasion, which kept private investors away from the region.

Public investment was also minimal, particularly the construction of roads.

The only alternative to a long land route via the town of Cuenca to Machala is maritime transport via the Gulf of Guayaquil.

After the war with Peru, a fear of a new invasion kept investors away from the region.

Attention from both the private and public sector was minimal.

He founded both the "Banco de Machala," which helped develop the trade of bananas in the El Oro Province of Ecuador, and later in 1971 founded "Banco del Pacifico."

He was known for creating credit approval policies friendly to all economic groups, including loans for small farmers and small businesses; microcredit for artisans and low income people.

From 1984 to 1986, he served as Ecuador's Minister of Agriculture under Leon Febres Cordero, as well as a number of other positions.

He was influential in bringing internet to much of Ecuador in the early 1990s.