World Trade Organization Now Has Its First Female and African Leader

A Nigerian economist and former finance minister, known for championing the poor and confronting corruption becomes the first African – and first woman – leader of the World Trade Organization.

“A strong World Trade Organization (W.T.O.) is vital if we are to recover fully and rapidly from the devastation wrought by the Covid-19 pandemic,” says Dr. says Ngozi Okinio-Iweala, an Harvard graduate who rose to the top ranks of the World Bank. “Our organization faces a great many challenges but working together we can collectively make the W.T.O. stronger, more agile and better adapted to the realities of today.”

Former finance minister – and the first woman in that position – in her native Nigeria, Okonjo-Iweala will reform the organization while steering global trade back on track, and closing the widening chasms between leading countries, and rich and poor nations. The creation of lasting rules for responding to pandemics is part of her top priorities.