WTO director-general, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has announced the appointment of her four Deputy Directors-General, with two women among them.
The women are Angela Ellard of the United States and Anabel González of Costa Rica.
Ambassador Jean-Marie Paugam of France and Ambassador Xiangchen Zhang of China completed the four slots.
“I am very pleased to announce the appointment of four new Deputy Directors-General at the WTO. It is the first time in the history of our Organization that half of the DDGs are women”, Okonjo-Iweala said today in a statement on WTO website.
“This underscores my commitment to strengthening our Organization with talented leaders whilst at the same time achieving gender balance in senior positions. I look forward to welcoming them to the WTO,” she said.
The new DDGs replace Yonov Frederick Agah of Nigeria, Karl Brauner of Germany, Alan Wolff of the United States and Yi Xiaozhun of China.
The deputies each take charge of four or five fields at the Geneva-based global trade body, such as legal affairs, market access, development, agriculture and commodities, and intellectual property.
Ellard has served at the US Congress as majority and minority chief trade counsel.
Gonzalez is a former foreign trade minister who also served as a senior director at the World Bank and as director of the agriculture and commodities division at the WTO.
Paugam was France’s permanent representative at the WTO and has held senior positions in the French economy and finance ministry.
Zhang is a vice minister in China’s Ministry of Commerce who was recently Beijing’s permanent representative to the WTO.
The organisation is holding a meeting of its general council on Wednesday and Thursday. The council is the WTO’s highest-level decision-making body in Geneva, featuring representatives from all 164 member states.
