Pedro Castro Benitez

Chief Operations Officer Asia Pacific

Pedro Castro is Chief Operations Officer Asia Pacific at Dufry, the leading travel retailer.

Pedro was born in Las Palmas, Canary Islands in 1967. He studied at the German School in Las Palmas and got his University Degree in Administration and Political Science from the Complutense University in Madrid in 1991, specializing in Foreign Affairs. He was awarded a Masters in International Relations at the Spanish Diplomatic School in Madrid and then became specialized in foreign trade through several courses with the Chamber of Commerce, Junta de Andalucía and finally ICEX, the Spanish official foreign trade institution.

He started his professional career as an intern with ICEX at the Spanish Embassy in Santiago de Chile, later becoming a market analyst in the same office. He joined duty free retailer Aldeasa in 1998 as General Manager for Chile, becoming Managing Director for Canariensis/Aldeasa in Spain in 2000.

From there he moved to Jordan and then in December 2006 he was appointed Operations Director for Spain, later becoming the International Operations Director for Aldeasa/World Duty Free Group (WDFG).

Pedro has held various positions within Dufry since the Swiss company acquired WDFG, including as a member of the Executive Committee. Currently he holds the position as Chief Operations Officer Asia Pacific, heading up Dufry’s business in nine countries in this region, from Dufry’s Hong Kong office.

In addition to his duties within the company, Pedro is an active supporter of the wider industry in regions where he specialises; he was a Board member of MEADFA from 2003-2007 and then of ASUTIL from 2010 to 2015.