Author: wpc_editor

Advisor to the Chairman and CEO of OCP Group (Morocco) since 2010. He works on a broad range of international issues for OCP, including African agricultural development and global food security. From 1996 to 2008, while at the World Bank, he played an important role in the international donor community’s efforts to understand and strengthen the contribution of information and communication technologies to economic development and poverty reduction. He also served as Executive Director of the Civic Education Project (CEP) (1993-1996). A political scientist by training, he has held senior positions in NGOs and research organizations and has taught at several U.S. universities.

Ambassador of France to the Kingdom of Morocco since 2015. He was Director for North Africa and the Middle East at the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Development (2012-2015). He was among others Ambassador of France to Vietnam (2010-2012), to Irak (2006-2009) and to Syria (2002-2006). He was advisor to the French Presidency (1998-2002) during President Jacques Chirac’s term.

CEO of Moroccan Airports Authority (ONDA) since 2014. Previously, he served as Senior Vice President of Royal Air Maroc including different executive positions within the company mainly in sales development, maintenance and services (2009-2014). He was also Chief Executive Officer of Atlas Blue, a low cost subsidiary of Royal Air Maroc (2004-2009) and Managing Director of Air Senegal International, a subsidiary of Royal Air Maroc based in Dakar (2000-2004). He graduated from the High Institute of Aerospace Engineering (ENSICA, Toulouse) and from the Mohammedia Engineering School (EMI-Rabat).

Speaker of the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia. Previously, Ana Brnabić was Prime Minister for almost eight years and as Minister of Public Administration and Autonomous Administration. She was Director of Continental Wind Serbia (CWS). She has more than ten years of experience in working with international organizations, foreign investors, local self-governments and the public sector in Serbia. She graduated in marketing from Hull University, UK.

President of the General Confederation of Moroccan Enterprises, which is the sole representative of the Moroccan private sector, from May 2012 to May 2018. She was the first woman in the MENA region to have been elected and reelected by her peers. She is one of the most influent entrepreneurs in Africa. She is the CEO of LES EAUX MINÉRALES D’OULMES and remains at the board of her family group, HOLMARCOM, one of the largest groups in Morocco and Africa, operating in multiple sectors. She is a member of several worldwide prestigious boards including Bank Al Maghrib (Morocco’s central bank), Renault Worldwide, Suez Worldwide, Care International Maroc and Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane.

Prime Minister of the Republic of Albania. A former professor of painting at the Academy of Fine Arts, a player of Albanian national basketball team and a renown publicist, he entered active politics as Minister of Culture in 1998. In 2000, he became Mayor of Tirana. He was re-elected as Mayor in 2003 and 2007 and led the Albanian capital for 11 years. In 2005, he was elected Chair of the Socialist Party of Albania. Elected Albania’s Prime Minister for the first time in 2013, Edi Rama was re-elected for two new mandates in 2017 and in 2021. With a remarkably rich and diverse career path, he counts his contribution in arts, sports and teaching, as a publicist and politician. His involvement in the public and political life of the country starts with the movement for democracy that led to the dismantling of the communist regime in Albania.

Member of the Executive Board, Bundesverband der Deutschen Industrie e. V. (BDI, Federation of German Industries) since 2010. He was a member of the management of the SWP (2002-2010) and director of research (2007-2009). In 2010, he moved from the Foundation for Science and Politics (SWP) to the Federation of German Industries (BDI). From May to October he was head of the Department of International Markets. He also worked as an advisor on Africa at the SWP, becoming head of the research group Africa and Middle East in 1997. He holds a doctorate in Political Sciences from the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich.

Founder and CEO of Foxintelligence. Before founding Foxintelligence, he has been co-Founder and Managing Director at Westwing France. Prior to that, he worked at Bain & Company in France for 4 years. He also worked at Amazon. He holds a master’s degree in business administration from HEC Business School, France.

Managing Director (Research) and Chief Economist of the Eurasian Development Bank since 2015. He is a member of the Advisory Council of the Central Bank of Russia, a member of the Council on Foreign and Defense policy, and a member of the Bretton Woods Committee. He worked at the IMF, where he was Advisor to the Executive Director for the Russian Federation in Washington (2001-2004). In 2004, he joined Deutsche Bank as Chief Economist; in 2009, he became Head of Company Research in Russia, and in 2011 a member of the Management Board of Deutsche Bank in Russia. He graduated from Harvard University, the Moscow State Institute of International Relations and the London School of Economics. He holds a PhD in Economics and is a professor at the department of World Economy at the Diplomatic Academy.

Vice President, Department of International Macroeconomics & Finance, Korea Institute for International Economic Policy (KIEP). He has been a Senior Research Fellow at the Department of International Macroeconomics & Finance at Korea Institute for International Economic Policy (KIEP) since October 2003. He specialized in macroeconomics, Japanese economy and environmental economics. He graduated from Seoul National University and he holds a PhD in economics from Hitotsubashi University.

Managing Partner of Mazars Morocco in charge of the development of activities in Africa. Former President of the African and South-South Commission, General Confederation of Moroccan Enterprises. He has more than 25 years of experience in consulting and advisory across the African continent. He also accompanies numerous Moroccan companies in their development on the African continent. His expertise in many economic sectors is regularly requested (Telecoms, Infrastructure, Health, Agriculture, Finance, etc.) as well as his knowledge of the African continent.

Economist specialized in consulting. His interests and his professional activity encompass natural resource economics (Morocco, Ethiopia, Tunisia, Benin among others) and social policy (Morocco, Sudan, West Africa). He has run a consulting company specialized in the economic sector, in Morocco for twenty years and he is still involved in it. He contributed to several Moroccan economic journals and he published in several reference books of the FAO, the World Bank and the University Mohammed V.

President of the General Council of Agricultural Development. He was chief agricultural negotiator in the free trade agreement between Morocco and the US. M. Ait Kadi is a member of the Hassan II Academy of Sciences and Technology and Professor at the Institute of Agronomy and Veterinary Medicine Hassan II. He is also a member of the Academy of Agriculture of France, Oslo International Water Academy and the International Advisory Panel of the Bioeconomy World Summit. He is honorary vice-president of the International Commission on Irrigation and Drainage. He has authored numerous publications in the fields of irrigation, water management and rural development.

Head of the Commercial and development policies Unit at the General Secretariat for European Affairs. He teaches International Economics at Sciences Po Paris and is a former Deputy Secretary general of the Paris Club at the French Ministry of Economy and Finance. He also worked as Former Portfolio manager at the French government shareholding agency, as Deputy Head of Official Development Assistance and Multilateral development Institutions at the French Ministry of Finance, as project officer at the French Development Agency in Beijing and as a research assistant at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He is a graduate from Sciences Po Paris, Ecole Polytechnique, Ecole Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées and Johns Hopkins University.

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs of the State of Qatar. He currently serves as the Chairman of Qatar Investment Authority and Qatar Development Fund. Previously he held the position of Assistant Foreign Minister for International Cooperation Affairs (2013). He has also served as Deputy Chairman of the Board of Directors of Qatar Mining Company. He joined the Supreme Council for Family Affairs in 2003 as an Economic Researcher and then became Director of Economic Affairs between 2005 and 2009. In June 2010, he was appointed Secretary of the Personal Representative of H.H. the Emir for Follow-up Affairs at the Emiri Diwan. He graduated in Economics and Business Administration from Qatar University.

Ambassador General Director of the Morocco International Cooperation Agency. He was the special advisor to the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation and Chief of Staff of the President of COP22.  Previously, he was advisor to the Minister of Economy and Finance in Morocco, and worked in strategy and management consulting at international consulting firms based in Paris.He also advised companies and investors on strategic projects in Morocco and African countries.He has an engineering diploma from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne and holds an MBA from College des Ingénieurs in Paris and a Certificate in Entrepreneurship from Babson College, USA.

Ambassador of the Kingdom of Morocco to the People’s Republic of China. Former Ambassador of the Kingdom of Morocco to the United States (2002-2011). He then embarked on a new career as an advisor for major Moroccan groups and multinationals. Previously, he served as the Moroccan ambassador to Italy, Malta, and, Albania, and the permanent representative to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Portugal, and Angola. He was the elected chairman of the Council of the FAO (2001-2005). He recently held the position of Ambassador for multilateral cooperation within the COP22 steering committee. He graduated from the HEC Graduate Business School in France.

Partnerships & Business Development Director for the Niger Delta Partnership Initiative (NDPI) Foundation. She joined NDPI in 2013 after serving as program manager on Africa at Vital Voices Global Partnership in Washington, D.C. She was named one of the 99 most influential foreign policy leaders under the age of 33 by Diplomatic Courier and Young Professionals in Foreign Policy in 2011 and one of 13 Young Africans Business/Economic Leaders to Watch in 2013 by Ventures Africa Magazine. She worked at the Women’s World Banking Ghana in Accra and Bank of America Merrill Lynch in New York City. She graduated from Georgetown University School of Foreign Service in Washington, D.C. and from Spelman College (Phi Beta Kappa).

Co-Founder and President of the Research Center for Cooperation and Peace Building (RCCP), a Lebanese NGO focused on Track II. She is a member of the working group at the Middle East at Hoover Institution, Stanford University. She is a member of the Steering Committee and an Advocacy Consultant for the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) National Agenda for the Future of Syria (NAFS) programme. She specializes in US-Arab relations and has a special interest in Syria. She is Editor of The Syrian Crisis: Effects on Regional and International Relations (2020) and has previously authored The Arab Lobby: Factors for Success and Failure (2016). She is a weekly Columnist in the Saudi newspaper Arab News and makes regular appearances on a series of Middle Eastern TV stations. She has co-directed, participated and presented scholarly papers in numerous conferences and workshops. She is currently working on a book project that researches the effect of regional competition on conflicts in Syria, Yemen, the Horn of Africa and Libya. She holds a Ph.D. in Politics from the University of Exeter as well as an MBA and a BBA from the AUB.

Senior Advisor to the Board, Toyota Motor Corporation since 2017. He joined Toyota Motor Corporation as an advisor in 2008. He held various positions such as senior managing officer, chief officer of the Corporate Planning Division, the Business Development Group and the IT Group, member of the board of directors, chief risk officer, and executive vice president. He was director-general of the Agency for Natural Resources and Energy Policy at the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry of Japan (METI). He joined the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) in 1972.He has been a Director of KDDI Corporation since 2013 and Chairman of The Toyota Foundation since 2016. He graduated from the University of Tokyo and from the University of Cambridge.

President of the Japan International Cooperation Agency. Before assuming the present post, he was President of the International University of Japan. He has been Professor of National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies (GRIPS) (2012-). He was Professor of Graduate Schools for Law and Politics, the University of Tokyo (1997-2004, 2006-2012), Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary, Deputy Permanent Representative of Japan to the United Nations (2004-2006), Professor of College of Law and Politics, Rikkyo University (1985-1997). He holds a PhD from the University of Tokyo. He is Emeritus Professor of the University of Tokyo.

Co-Director of the Berlin based think tank Stiftung Neue Verantwortung (SNV). He helped establish SNV’s European Digital Agenda program and has shaped the development of SNV into the leading think tank at the intersection of technology and public policy in Germany. He has worked and published on a wide range of issues such as cyber security, surveillance & privacy, and future of work. Prior to joining SNV he coordinated the public affairs section of the US Consulate General in Hamburg and taught and researched as an Assistant Professor of political science at the University of Northern Colorado. He holds a PhD in political science from the University of Pennsylvania.

Director of the Center for Energy & Climate of Ifri since 2017. Prior to joining Ifri, he spent six years at the International Energy Agency (IEA), notably as Russia & Sub-Saharan Africa Programme Manager where he conducted oil and gas market analyses and was responsible for institutional relations with these countries and regions. He also held various other positions, such as at the Robert Schuman Foundation, where he was in charge of a Ukraine observatory. A French and German national, he holds a Ph.D. from Sciences Po Paris in International Relations. He represents Ifri at the French observatory of raw materials for industrial value chains (Ofremi).

Former President of Mongolia. He is a public servant, a freedom fighter, and a policymaker. In 1990, he was one of the key leaders of the Mongolian Democratic Revolution and since then has continuously served Mongolia as a member of Parliament four times, Prime Minister two times, and President for two terms. During his career, Mr. Elbegdorj prioritized strengthening the rule of law in Mongolia, fostering social justice, fighting poverty, combating corruption, supporting environmental sustainability, and advancing active participatory democracy. Currently, he is continuing his work to improve public policy, governance, and democracy through the Elbegdorj Institute, a think tank he found in 2008. Mr. Elbegdorj is now Commissioner of the International Commission against Death Penalty (ICDP), Patron of the World Sustainable Development Forum (WSDF), member of World Leadership Alliance – Club de Madrid and President of the World Mongol Federation. He holds Master of Public Administration from Harvard University John F. Kennedy School of Government (2002) and Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism from Land Forces Military Academy of Lviv City (Ukraine) of former USSR (1988). 

Executive Director, CIRTECH-CTC. He has over six years of experience in political consulting. He began his career in the management of development projects before specializing in public communications. His experience led him to work for nongovernmental organizations and governments. He currently works as an advisor to numerous African statesmen and politicians on political strategy and public policy. He is very active in the volunteering field; he is also the outgoing curator of the Dakar Hub of Global Shapers Community of the World Economic Forum and is a Mandela Washington Fellowship Alumni. He graduated from the Bordeaux Management School.

Co-founder of Finn AI, she has been a forerunner in the area of financial technology. Her company uses conversational artificial intelligence (AI) to build virtual assistants for banks. By leveraging this leading-edge technology, banks can engage with their customers in channels where they are already active, such as Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, via native iOS and Android apps, and others. Using simple, human conversation, Finn AI empowers people to learn and grow with their money, promoting financial literacy around the world. Before founding Finn AI, she worked at the Global Fund in Geneva where she managed a USD $250 million health investment portfolio.

As CEO of MA Aerospace and former Chairman of the Moroccan Aerospace Industries Association (GIMAS), he played a key role the last 20 years in the emergence and the development of the aircraft industry in Morocco. He participated actively in the construction of Royal Air Maroc, in its fleet modernization and in its international development in support of the social and economic development of the country. He is Chairman or board member of several companies in the aircraft, international hotel and solar industries. He is also a member of strategic advisory councils of universities and the President of IMA. He is qualified in Engineering from INPG.

President of the Korea Institute for International Economic Policy (KIEP) since June 2020. Chairing the Korea National Committee for Pacific Economic Cooperation, President Kim is currently President of the APEC Studies Association of Korea. He is a member of the Presidential Committee on Northern Economic Cooperation, an Advisory Board member for the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy, and the Chair on the Economy and Trade Division of the Korea-China Committee for the Future from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Prior to the current positions, President Kim was among the Advisory Staff to the Deputy Prime Minister/Minister of Finance & Economy of Korea, and had been a key Advisor to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade on the Korea-EU FTA during the negotiation. He was a Fulbright Scholar in the UC Berkeley, and was an Honorary member of the High Table in Christ Church, Oxford.