women and trade
WTO Gender Research Hub members
The WTO launched the Gender Research Hub to deepen understanding of women’s economic empowerment through trade by fostering further research and data collection efforts. The Hub serves as an information-sharing and knowledge-gathering platform where the latest findings of researchers and experts can be shared globally. It also aims to foster research partnerships, help gather research for easier access to experts' findings, bring visibility to the work on trade and gender and promote the topic as a recognised field of research and expertise.
Members of the Hub include trade and gender researchers and experts from the WTO Secretariat, seven International organisations and regional organisations, eight universities and four WTO Chairs.
List of members
Anoush der Boghossian, World Trade Organization (WTO), Head of Trade and Gender, Gender Policy Advisor, Chair and Founder of the WTO Gender Research Hub
Ms. Anoush der Boghossian is the WTO Gender Policy Adviser and the Head of the WTO Trade and Gender Unit. She was appointed as the WTO's first trade and gender expert by former Director-General Roberto Azevêdo in 2017. She is one of the Co-Authors of the WTO/World Bank report on "Women and Trade" and has published many articles and working papers on trade and gender. With 4 other experts, she organised and delivered a panel at SIEL 2021 Milan Global Conference on "Mainstreaming Gender in Trade and Investment Agreements: Best Practice Examples & the Missing Elements". She is also the Chair of the WTO Gender Research Hub. Anoush is a senior staff member of the WTO with 15 years' experience in the Organization. Prior her current responsibilities, Anoush worked as the French Language Spokesperson of the WTO, as the press officer to the former Director-General Pascal Lamy and to the former Deputy Director-General Valentine Rugwabiza, focusing on media operations in Africa. She also served the WTO as the NGO Liaison Officer and managed the WTO Public Forum for 4 years.
Theresa Carpenter, Economic Affairs Officer, Trade Analysis Branch, Division on International Trade and Commodities, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development
Dr Theresa Carpenter is an expert in International Trade Policy, specifically the multilateral system and regional trade agreements. She currently serves as Economic Affairs Officer at the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, where has contributed to work on non-tariff measures; trade in services for development; and trade aspects of critical minerals for the energy transition. Previous roles include affiliate faculty at the University of Sussex and head of research on trade at the Geneva Graduate Institute. Previously she worked as a management consultant with EY. She is a founding member of the WTO’s Gender Research Hub. Dr Carpenter holds a PhD in Economics and a Masters in International Relations from the Graduate Institute Geneva; and a BA (Hons) in Economics with German from the University of Sussex.
Renata Amaral, Women inside Trade, American University, Trade Policy Expert
Dr. Renata Vargas Amaral is an experienced international trade lawyer, with an extensive and proven record of successful engagement at the WTO, bilateral and regional trade negotiations, domestic trade policy and market access. She currently serves as Adjunct Professor at the American University Washington College of Law, where she co-directs the certificate program on WTO and US Trade Law and Policy. Dr. Amaral is Founder and President of Women Inside Trade, a non-profit international organization created in 2017 that aims to contribute to the empowerment of women through its global network of professionals, specialized training and leadership development. She holds a PhD from Maastricht University in the Netherlands and the title of Doctor of Laws from the Federal University of Santa Catarina in Brazil. Her current research in the field of trade and gender focus on the development of gender provisions in trade and investment agreements.
Cerme Balaban, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Junior Trade Policy Analyst
Cemre Balaban is a Junior Trade Policy Analyst at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Her work focuses on policies and trends that affect international services trade flows, responsible business conduct in global value chains as well as trade and gender in the context of Aid for Trade. Prior to joining the OECD, Cemre was appointed as a delegate to the Permanent Mission of Switzerland to the WTO and EFTA (UNCTAD, UNECE, ITC). She holds a Bachelor’s and a Master’s degree in political science from the University of Zurich as well as a Certificate of Advanced Studies in EU Law from the Europe Institute at the University of Zurich.
Amrita Bahri, Instituto Te
cnológico Autónomo de México (ITAM), WTO Chair for Mexico
Dr. Amrita Bahri is Associate Professor of International Trade Law at ITAM and Co-Chair Professor for WTO Chair Program (Mexico). Amrita has published in the areas of international trade law, WTO dispute settlement, capacity-building in emerging economies, trade and gender. She has authored the monograph Public Private Partnership for WTO dispute settlement: Enabling Developing Countries (Edward Elgar, 2018). Her academic articles are published in prestigious journals including Journal of International Economic Law, World Trade Review, Journal of World Trade, Trade, Law & Development, Global Trade & Customs Journal, and Journal of International Trade Law & Policy. Working with ITC’s team, Amrita has designed the very first framework to measure gender-responsiveness of free trade agreements. She explains this framework in ITC’s policy paper titled “Mainstreaming Gender in Free Trade Agreements”.
Mariya Brussevich, International Monetary Fund (IMF), Economist
Mariya Brussevich is an economist in the IMF’s Research Department. Her research interests center around international trade, inequality, and structural transformation. Prior to joining the Research Department, she was an economist in the Fiscal Affairs and Asia and Pacific Departments, where her work focused on program countries and low-income countries. She holds a PhD in Economics from Purdue University.
Javiera Paz Cáceres, Institute of International Studies of the University of Chile (IEI), Instructor Professor
Javiera is Instructor Professor at the Institute of International Studies of the University of Chile (IEI). She holds a BA in English Literature and Linguistics from the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile and a MA in International Strategy and Trade Policy at the University of Chile. Prior to joining the University, she was an intern at the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) and the Latin American Trade in Services Network (REDLAS). Her main research interests are gender and trade, intellectual property, new technologies, and trade policy. She has been a consultant for the World Bank, Interamerican Development Bank, ECLAC, and the Chilean Under-Secretariat of International Economic Affairs on international trade and trade policy issues. Amongst her research experience, it can be highlighted her works on projects regarding gender mainstreaming in trade policy (UNESCAP – IADB), internationalization of services for the Chilean trade promotion agency (ProChile), the impact of artificial intelligence on copyright protection (Ministry of Culture, Heritage and the Arts, Chile), and the use of digital economy provisions for post-pandemic recovery (UNESCAP – IADB). At the IEI, she coordinates the Diplomas on Trade Policy, International Development, and Women and Global Public Policies; lectures on international negotiations and trade policy issues at both undergraduate and graduate levels; and is editor of the Latin American Journal of Trade Policy.
Judit Fabian, University of Ottawa, Visiting Scholar
Judit Fabian is a visiting researcher at the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa and a fellow of the Canadian Global Affairs Institute. For more than two decades she has studied, advocated for and published on the inclusion of gender as a legitimate subject of global trade governance. She also studies and publishes on the theory and architecture of global economic governance. This includes her Ph.D. dissertation, “Towards a Theory of Democratic Global Economic Governance: Hybridization of Soft and Hard Law in the Case of Gender within the World Trade Organization,” completed in political science at Carleton University.
On 13 November 2023, Ms. Fabian, along with Simonetta Zarrilli, received the first ever Gender Equality Pioneer Award, presented by the WTO at the Youth Trade Summit on Gender.
Sanaz Javadi Farahzadi, lawyer, lecturer and international adviser
Sanaz Javadi Farahzadi is a lawyer, lecturer, mentor and international adviser to United Nations agencies, European Union, governments, academia, and the private sector on technical assistance projects on intellectual property, international trade and gender equality in Europe, Middle East, Africa and South East Asia. She holds a master in Intellectual Property Law, LLM in International Trade Law, Doctoral Researcher in Law. She has been working with the World Intellectual Property Organization, the Swiss Federal Institute of Intellectual Property, the South Center, UNIDROIT, UNCTAD, International Trade center, the Graduate Institute of Geneva, Cambridge University and Women in International Affairs Network (WIAN). She is the Vice President of the Organization of Women in International Trade, OWIT, Geneva.
Elisa Fornalé, World Trade Institute, Professor
Elisa Fornalé is Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) Professor at the World Trade Institute (WTI), University of Bern. Since 2021, she is the Principal Investigator of the SNSF project “Gender Equality in the Mirror (GEM)” which explores women’s participatory rights. In 2018, she was appointed as the WTI’s Gender Coordinator, with the mandate to implement the Gender Action Plan at the WTI. Within this framework, she created the Gender Team “Know the GAP”, which conducts activities to promote awareness and discussion about gender equality, diversity, and resilience to inequalities within our academic community and in a broader context. Against this background, prof. Fornalé initiated the “Gender Lecture Series – Know the GAP” in 2019 and the Summer Course on “Gender and Trade” in 2021. In parallel, she is implementing the SNSF project “Framing Environmental Degradation, Human Mobility and Human Development as a Matter of Common Concern” (www.climco2.org). The project aims to identify the climate-mobility nexus change through a pilot case study in the Small Pacific Island States- In May 2021, she has been appointed as Co-Rapporteur of the ILA Committee on sea level rise and international law.
Alicia Frohmann, Gender, Social Inclusion and Trade and ECLAC, Consultant
Alicia Frohmann is a senior trade policy expert, with experience both as a negotiator and policy maker in the Chilean government and as an international consultant to developing countries. She is Professor in trade policy at the University of Heidelberg Center in Santiago, and at the Institute of International Studies, University of Chile. She is also Senior consultant to the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), delivering technical assistance on gender and trade to developing countries (Chile, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Peru and Uruguay) and the Pacific Alliance. She has served as Lead Labour negotiator and Technical Coordinator of Chile’s free-trade negotiations with the US, and as Director of ProChile, the international trade promotion network. As a consultant, she has advised several Latin American governments on issues related to trade and sustainable development issues, as well as gender-specific trade policies. She is Team leader, Project on Gender and Social Inclusion in Trade and Investment Promotion in Paraguay, BKP, EDM/Canada (2021-2022) and Senior expert for the TAF2+ (UKAid) project on Gender, Social Inclusion, and Trade Network (2019-2021).
Erin Hannah, King’s University College at the University of Western Ontario, Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Political Science
Erin Hannah is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Political Science at King’s University College at the University of Western Ontario. Her research and teaching interests include international political economy, development, gender and trade, global governance, global civil society, and the role of expert knowledge in global trade. She has published extensively on these topics in Review of International Political Economy, Journal of International Economic Law, Globalizations, Journal of World Trade, World Trade Review, World Economy, Third World Quarterly, Journal of Civil Society, Politics, and Global Policy. She is currently engaged in a collaborative project funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) on Gender and Global Trade, which examines the conditions under which trade can act as a lever for progressive social change, gender equality, and sustainable development. She is co-editor of Expert Knowledge in Global Trade (Abingdon: Routledge, 2015) and author of NGOs and Global Trade: non-state voices in EU trade policymaking (Abingdon: Routledge, 2016).
Dorotea López Giral, University of Chile, Director of the International Studies Institute, WTO Chair of Chile
Dorotea López Giral is an Economist from the Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México ITAM, Mexico. She holds a Master of Philosophy in Economics from Cambridge University, UK and a PhD in Social Sciences form University of Chile. She is a full professor at the University of Chile. Her main research is in the area of trade and services.
Trudi Hartzenberg, Executive Director, Trade Law Centre (tralac)
Trudi Hartzenberg is the Executive Director of the Trade Law Centre (tralac). She is responsible for development of the tralac strategy, resource mobilisation and engagement with African governments, regional, continental and international organisations. She currently serves on the WTO Chairs Advisory Committee and is a member of the Committee for Development Policy of the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). She supports women’s economic empowerment: focusing on women traders in national and regional business associations, and also heads up SheGovernsTrade — a empowerment program for young women trade policy makers. Her research areas include international trade, competition policy, industrial development and Africa’s integration agenda. She has a special interest in capacity building. She designs and delivers academic and tailored short courses a broad range of trade-related topics, investment, competition policy and industrialisation.
Nadia Hasham, African Trade Policy Centre of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), Trade Policy Expert
Nadia is a Trade Policy Expert at the African Trade Policy Centre of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, where she manages the trade and gender portfolio, particularly around gender mainstreaming, knowledge generation, and capacity building relating to the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) Agreement. She also works on digital and sustainable trade facilitation and private sector engagement. Prior to this, Nadia was Senior Data Analyst at the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs contributing to strategic initiatives to provide evidence to decision-makers. She was previously based in Sierra Leone as a Country Economist for International Growth Centre (IGC) at the London School of Economics, working with the government on evidence-based economic policy. Her previous experience includes managing economic research and evaluations in various regions. Nadia holds a Master of International Affairs degree from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs focusing on Economic and Political Development, and a Bachelor of Arts (Hons) degree in International Development and Middle East Studies from McGill University.
Adam Jakubik, International Monetary Fund, Economist
Adam Jakubik is an Economist working on trade policy issues in the Strategy, Policy and Review Department at the International Monetary Fund. Previously he has worked in the Economic Research and Statistics Division at the World Trade Organization (2016-20) on research, policy publications and as economic advisor to dispute settlement proceedings. He holds a PhD in economics from the European University Institute, and master’s and bachelor’s degrees in economics from University College London. He has published on the labour market effects of trade, trade in services, and global value chains.
Susan Joekes, University of London, Research Associate of the Department of Economics
Susan Joekes is an independent researcher, currently a Research Associate of the Department of Economics, SOAS (School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London). She was for many years a Fellow of the Institute of Development Studies, Sussex, UK and has been on the staff of the International Centre for Research on Women (ICRW) and Canada’s International Development Research Centre (IDRC). At IDRC she managed global and Middle East and North African regional programming on gender and development, trade, employment, SMEs and entrepreneurship, and competition policy. Latterly she has worked on two gender and trade projects for the UK FCDO, advising low income countries on the development, design and implementation of inclusive trade policy.
Susanne Kavelaar, International Finance Corporation (IFC), Global Head of Trade Advisory and Trade Business Development Lead for Southern African Countries
Susanne Kavelaar is the Global Head of Trade Advisory and Trade Business Development Lead for Southern African Countries at IFC, the World Bank Group. Susanne has 23 years of experience in international trade finance including structured finance, warehouse financing, and supply chain finance. She was responsible for various trade projects and structures on all continents, and lived in The Netherlands, Spain, Germany, France and Argentina. In her capacity of Head of Trade Advisory, she co-leads the Women Research on Trade Finance. Susanne headed up the Diversity and Inclusion in the Southern Cone of LAC during multiple years and steers efforts of the Banking on Women Module under GTFP. She started her career in the agricultural commodity trade business working for A.C. Toepfer International and ADM, and joined IFC in 2010 . Susanne holds a Master of Arts of Latin American Studies/Management of the University of Leiden, The Netherlands and is Member of Women Corporate Directors, Argentine Chapter.
Jane Korinek, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Trade Policy Analyst
Jane Korinek is an Economist and Trade Policy Analyst in the Trade and Agriculture Directorate of the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Her recent policy research has examined how trade impacts women and men differently, and how trade policies can support women’s economic empowerment. She is presently researching how trade impacts women in New Zealand in a joint project with the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade. Her other policy research has been in areas such as the benefits of good regulation in the extractive industries, global value chains, services competitiveness, impacts of regional trade agreements, trade costs, short-term trade finance and an early study (2005) on trade and gender. Jane is a Canadian and American national. She holds an undergraduate degree in Economics from Duke University and graduate degree in International Economic Policy from Stanford University.
Katrin Kulhmann, Visiting Professor at Georgetown University Law Center and Faculty Co-Director of the Center on Inclusive Trade and Development
Professor Katrin Kuhlmann is a full-time Visiting Professor at Georgetown University Law Center and Faculty Co-Director of the Center on Inclusive Trade and Development. She is also the President and Founder of the New Markets Lab, a non-profit law and development center and innovation lab for inclusive legal and regulatory design. She has over twenty-five years of experience in international law, development, and trade. Her work and research focus on trade and development, comparative economic law, trade and gender, regional trade agreements (with a particular focus on Africa), and the interdisciplinary connections between law and development. She is also a Senior Associate with the Global Food Security Project of the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS); member of the Trade Advisory Committee on Africa at the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR); member of the Bretton Woods Committee; member of the Trade and Investment Law Group of the Law Schools Global League; and member of the international advisory network of the Forum on Trade, Environment, and the SDGs of the Graduate Institute and UN Environment Programme. Previously, she was a Lecturer on Law at Harvard Law School; Senior Fellow and Director at the Aspen Institute; trade negotiator at USTR; and international lawyer in private practice. J.D. Harvard Law School; BA Creighton University; Fulbright Scholar 1992.
Marianne Matthee, University of Pretoria’s Gordon Institute of Business Science, Research Director
Marianne Matthee is a full-time faculty member and research director of the University of Pretoria’s Gordon Institute of Business Science in South Africa. Her research focus is on the field of international trade, particularly exports. Marianne’s interest in trade and gender research is centred on understanding the gender wage gap within exporting firms and possible transmission mechanisms of the gap.
José-Antonio Monteiro, World Trade Organization (WTO), Research Economist
José-Antonio Monteiro is Research Economist in the Economic Research and Statistics Division of the World Trade Organisation (WTO). Besides providing economic advice to dispute settlement panels, he conducts research on international trade issues, including sustainable development and inclusiveness. Among other things, he co-authored the WTO/UNCTAD "Advance Guide to Trade Policy Analysis: The Structural Gravity Model". He was also the coordinator and lead author of the joint WTO/World Bank Report on "Women and Trade", the World Trade Report 2017 on "Trade, Technology and Jobs" and the World Trade Report 2021 on "Economic Resilience and Trade". Before joining the WTO, he worked at the International Labour Organization (ILO) in the Trade and Labour Programme, with a particular focus on labour provisions in regional trade agreements. He holds a PhD in economics in the area of trade and environment from the University of Neuchatel (Switzerland), as well as a Master on economics and finance from the University of Geneva (Switzerland).
Anu Peltola, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), Acting Head of Statistics and Information,
Anu Peltola coordinates UNCTAD’s work on SDG indicators and oversees projects to develop new statistics and strengthen countries’ statistical capacity, e.g., to measure gender equality in international trade. In a joint project with UNECA and UNECE, UNCTAD supports interested countries wishing to measure the impact of international trade on gender equality and analyse the related impacts of COVID-19 using official statistics and building on existing data and capacity of each country. The methods and analysis are developed in collaboration with countries, the EU Commission DG Trade, UN Women and other partners.
Roberta Piermartini, World Trade Organization (WTO), Chief of Trade Costs Analysis
Roberta Piermartini is Chief of Trade Costs Analysis at the WTO. She has 20 years' experience in research on trade, trade policy and inclusive development. She has published extensively in academic journals and various books. She is lead author of the World Trade Report as well as coordinator for WTO-WB joint publications on gender and poverty. She is author of two WTO-UNCTAD joint publications on trade policy modelling. She has served the WTO Dispute Settlement in several Panel and Arbitration cases. Her work has been covered by The Economist and Le Monde. Prior to joining the WTO in 2000, she was lecturer in economics and statistics at the University of Southampton and research fellow in the research division of Confindustria. She also has been teaching at the University of Geneva and LUISS. She holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Southampton.
Janneke Pieters Wageningen University, Associate Professor
Janneke Pieters is an Associate Professor in the Development Economics Group at Wageningen University, Research Fellow at the Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), and Non-Resident Senior Research Fellow at UNU-WIDER. Her research interests are primarily in the fields of labor economics and development economics, with a focus on women’s role in the economy and gender inequality in the labor market. She is interested in the impacts of trade and globalization on gender inequality and has published on the links between trade liberalization in the 1990s and women's labor market outcomes in Brazil, Indonesia, and India.
Jennifer Poole, the School of International Service at American University, Associate Professor of Economics
Professor Poole is Associate Professor of Economics in the School of International Service at American University. Her research and teaching interests fall at the intersection of international trade, labor economics, and development economics. With an emphasis on Brazil, her broad research agenda considers the effects of global integration on local labor markets. Specifically, she studies the role of labor institutions in influencing local adjustments to shocks and the implications of information transfer in trade and investment. Recent research investigates the impacts of multinational firms on gender equality and the role of trade on the informal economy. Her research has been published in the Journal of Development Economics, the Journal of International Economics, and the Review of Economics and Statistics, and has been funded by the National Science Foundation, UNCTAD, the World Bank, the IDB, and UNU-WIDER. She recently served as Senior International Economist in President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers and has also served as a visiting scholar at the World Bank, among other institutions.
Dr. Jan Yves Remy, University of the West Indies, Director of the Shridath Ramphal Centre for International Trade Law, Policy and Services, WTO Chair for Barbados
Jan Yves Remy is Director of the Shridath Ramphal Centre for International Trade Law, Policy and Services (SRC) of University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus, Barbados. In addition to her outreach and research activities on issues of international trade relevant to the Caribbean region, she teaches trade law, women and trade issues, and regional integration in the SRC’s flagship Masters in International Trade Policy Programme. Her doctoral thesis focused on the role of the Caribbean Court of Justice in promoting Caribbean regional integration. She is also the WTO Chair for the University of the West Indies. Jan Yves holds a Ph.D. in International Law (summa cum laude) from the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies (Geneva, Switzerland), an LL.M (Hons) in Commercial and International Law from the University of Cambridge (UK) and an LL.B. (Hons) from the University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus (Barbados). Prior to joining the SRC, Jan Yves worked for five years as a Senior Trade Associate at the offices of Sidley Austin LLP in Geneva and Washington D.C and as a Legal Officer at the Appellate Body Secretariat of the WTO, where she assisted Members of the Appellate Body in their disposition of appeals in trade disputes.
Adrienne Roberts, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Politics at the University of Manchester
Adrienne Roberts is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Politics at the University of Manchester. She specializes in feminist international political economy with a particular focus on the gendered relations of finance, debt, development, and trade. Current research projects include (1) projects funded by SSHRC and SSHRC/ESRC on gendering global trade (with Erin Hannah and Silke Trommer); (2) research on gender, financial inclusion and entrepreneurship promotion in Pakistan (with Ghazal Mir Zulfiqar); and (3) research on the gendered relations of debt and finance in contemporary and historical perspective. She has published extensively in academic journals in the fields of International Political Economy, International Relations, Gender Studies and Development Studies.
Léa Marie Rouanet, World Bank Africa Gender Innovation Lab, Economist
Léa is an Economist working at the World Bank Africa Gender Innovation Lab, where she leads the agriculture thematic area. Her current research identifies and addresses gender-based constraints to economic activity in sub-Saharan Africa, focusing on agriculture, youth employment, socio-emotional skills, gender-based violence and adolescent girls programming. She is currently involved in several impact evaluations on these topics across Africa. Before joining the World Bank, she was a PhD candidate and Research Fellow at the Paris School of Economics, where her research focused on nutrition, child mortality, fertility and gender preferences in Africa. She holds a PhD from the Paris School of Economics.
Heidi Stensland Warren, World Bank Group (WBG), Senior Private Sector Specialist
Heidi Stensland Warren is a Senior Private Sector Specialist with the Macroeconomics, Trade and Investment Global Practice of the World Bank Group. She co-manages the World Bank Group’s flagship trade facilitation programs and provides technical support to a number of countries on border management processes and procedures. Heidi is a certified Gender Specialist and leads the World Bank’s efforts on trade facilitation and gender. Since joining the World Bank in 2006, Heidi has helped create and lead a number of larger programs, including the joint WB-IFC Norwegian Trust Fund for Private Sector and Infrastructure, the Development Grant Facility, the Netherlands Partnership Program and Korea’s cross WB-IFC Partnership Facility. Prior to joining the World Bank Group, Heidi worked with the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the UN Association and in the Norwegian private sector.
Victor Stolzenburg, World Trade Organization (WTO), Research Economist
Victor Stolzenburg is a Research Economist with the Economic Research and Statistics Division of the WTO. Before joining the WTO, he has worked as a consultant for the World Bank, UNIDO, and the ILO. He has obtained his PhD from the Graduate Institute in Geneva. His research interests are in international trade and development with a focus on global value chains and gender equality. His research studies the interlinkages between trade and gender wage and education gaps in developing economies.
Amelia Santos-Paulino, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), Chief of the Investment Research Section
Dr. Amelia U. Santos-Paulino is Chief of the Investment Research Section Chief of Investment Issues Section at UNCTAD’s Division on Investment and Enterprise, and Deputy Editor of the Transnational Corporations Journal. Previously, she was a Senior Economist at UNCTAD’s Africa, Least Developed Countries and Special Programmes Division. Before joining UNCTAD, she was Research Fellow and Project Director in the United Nations University’s World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER) in Helsinki, Research Fellow in the University of Sussex’s Institute of Development Studies, and Senior Research Economist in the Central Bank of the Dominican Republic. She served as Senior Adviser of the Dominican Republic’s Government on International Trade and Investment for the negotiations of the US-DR-CAFTA Free Trade Agreement, amongst other full-time posts within the civil service and academia of the Dominican Republic. She has also held visiting posts at the University of California, Davis, the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva, Fudan University in Shanghai, and the Asian Development Bank Institute in Tokyo. Her work has been published in journals including the Economic Journal, Cambridge Journal of Economics, and World Development, and has also edited books published by Oxford University Press and Cambridge University Press. She holds PhD and MA degrees in Economics from the University of Kent in the UK.
Makiko Toyoda, International Finance Corporation (IFC), Global Lead of the Global Trade Finance Program
Makiko is the Global Lead of the Global Trade Finance Program (GTFP) at IFC, the World Bank Group, based in Washington, D.C. She is heading IFC’s flagship trade finance program since 2017 and is a member of WTO’s Trade Finance Expert Working Group. She launched IFC’s first gender trade finance program in 2019. Makiko joined IFC in 2003 and has 30 years of banking experience having worked in Washington, D.C., Johannesburg, Hong Kong, Kazakhstan (Almaty/Astana), London, Frankfurt, and Tokyo. Prior to joining IFC, she worked for the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) where she was in charge of trade finance programs in CIS countries, and also for the Industrial Bank of Japan (IBJ) where she was the Deputy General Manager. Makiko holds a BA degree in Economics from Keio University and a Master's degree from SAIS, Johns Hopkins University.
Silke Trommer, University of Manchester, Senior Lecturer
Dr Silke Trommer is Senior Lecturer and PhD Programme Director in the Politics Department of the University of Manchester, UK. She has published widely on the international political economy of trade and is, among others, author of Transformations in Trade Politics: Participatory Trade Politics in West Africa (Routledge, 2014) and co-author of Expert Knowledge in Global Trade (Routledge, 2016). Her current research focuses on the spread of gender as a policy norm in trade governance, gender mainstreaming in global trade, and on the links between trade, health and gender.
Elisabeth van Lieshout, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Trade Policy Analyst
Dr Elisabeth van Lieshout is a Trade Policy Analyst at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Her work there examines the policies and trends that shape international flows of trade in services. She is currently doing research on the participation of women entrepreneurs in trade and the gender export gap. She holds a PhD in political science and an MA in economics from Stanford University.
Simonetta Zarrilli, Advisor for trade and gender at the Asia-Pacific Research and Training Network on Trade (ARTNeT), Former Chief of the Trade, Gender and Development Programme, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD)
Simonetta Zarrilli headed the Trade, Gender and Development Programme of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), a programme she launched in 2010 and led until 1 Febuary 2024. She was equally the organization's Gender Focal Point. Under her leadership, the Programme provides analytical and policy support to member countries on the gender implications of trade policy, and trains academics, policymakers and civil society representatives on trade, gender and development issues. The Programme plays an active role in the global debate on trade and gender, gender equality and women's economic empowerment for the realization of the 2030 Development Agenda.
Prior to leading this work area, Ms. Zarrilli worked on a number of trade and development related topics, including trade and environment, intellectual property rights, agro-biotechnology, renewable energy, trade in services, preferential tariff treatments, standards and regulations. She has published books, academic papers, policy briefs, and official UN documents. She has also carried out numerous analytical, intergovernmental and technical cooperation activities in the above-mentioned areas.
On 13 November 2023, Ms. Zarrilli, along with Judit Fabian of the University of Ottawa, received the first ever Gender Equality Pioneer Award, presented by the WTO at the Youth Trade Summit on Gender.
Ms. Zarrilli holds a postgraduate degree in European Studies from the College of Europe, Bruges (Belgium) and a degree in Law from the University of Siena (Italy). She is fluent in English, French, Spanish and Portuguese, apart from her native Italian.
Jessica Leight, International Food Policy Research Institute, Research Follow
Jessica Leight is a Research Fellow in the Poverty, Health and Nutrition Division at IFPRI; previously, she served as an assistant professor of economics at American University from 2017 to 2019 and Williams College from 2013 to 2017. She received a Ph.D. in economics at MIT in 2013, a M.Phil. in Economics at Oxford as a Rhodes scholar in 2008, and a B.A. from Yale University in 2006. Her research agenda focuses on human capital accumulation for women and girls as well as agricultural institutions and structural transformation, and has been funded by the Macarthur Foundation, the Fondation de France, USAID, the Department of Labor, and a number of other donors. She has conducted or is actively conducting fieldwork in Nigeria, Ethiopia, Burkina Faso, Mozambique, India, and Kenya.
Sangeeta Khorana, Professor of International Trade Policy at Aston University and Trustee Director of the Institute of Export and international Trade in the United Kingdom
Sangeeta Khorana is Professor and Endowed Chair of International Trade Policy at Aston University; she is also Trustee Director of the Institute of Export and international Trade in the United Kingdom. She leads research on trade and gender issues, and trade liberalisation in general. She has published several books, book chapters and journal articles on trade and gender issues. She has successfully completed funded research projects for the British High Commission India, UK-ESRC, Commonwealth Secretariat, European Commission, InterAmerican Development Bank (IADB), World Bank-OECS, World Bank-ITCILO, UNCTAD-India, among others. She has a PhD from the University of St. Gallen and a summa cum laude Masters’ degree in trade law and economics from Switzerland as well as MA Economics from India.
Carmine Soprano, Senior Trade & Gender Specialist, World Bank Group
Carmine Soprano is a development economist, policy advisor, and academic lecturer with 15-year experience working on private sector development, women's/youth economic empowerment and small-scale trade facilitation within international financial institutions, UN agencies, governments and private sector. He currently serves as trade & gender lead under the Trade Facilitation West Africa (TFWA) program, and also regularly advises governments, UN agencies, and private sector on the same topics. In addition, he lectures on trade & gender at ‘’Tor Vergata’’ University of Rome and at the Italian Society of International Organizations (SIOI) in his native Italy.
Intan Hamdan-Livramento, Senior Economic Officer, World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)
Dr. Intan Hamdan-Livramento is an economist working at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in Geneva, Switzerland. She is one of the four authors of the World Intellectual Property Report, one of WIPO’s flagship publications. Intan is responsible for conducting and supervising research areas on the economics of innovation, intellectual property (IP), and economic development.
Intan received her doctorate in economics of innovation from the École Polytechnique Fédéralé de Lausanne. She holds a Diplome d’études approfondies in international economics from the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva, and a Master’s in international law and economics from the World Trade Institute in Berne, Switzerland.
Previously, Intan worked at the International Monetary Fund and the World Trade Organization.
Julio Raffo, Head, Innovation Economy Section, Department of Economics and Data Analytics, World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)
Julio Raffo is Head of the Innovation Economy Section at the Department of Economics and Data Analytics of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).
Before joining WIPO, he had research experience in the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL, Switzerland); the Institut Français des Relations Internationales (IFRI, France); the Pan-American Health Organization (PAHO, USA); the Red Iberoamericana/Interamericana de Indicadores de Ciencia y Tecnología (RICYT); the Centro de Estudios en Ciencia, Desarrollo y Educación Superior (REDES/CONICET, Argentina); EUROSTAT’s Science, Technology and Innovation Statistics unit (STI, Luxembourg); and, the Instituto de Estudios Sociales de la Ciencia (IEC-UNQ, Argentina).
He holds an Economics degree from the Universidad de Buenos Aires, a Master degree in Industrial Organization, Innovations and International Strategy and a PhD in Economics from the Université de Paris Nord.
His main research interests are the economics and metrics of innovation and intellectual property, with a particular focus on their intersection with socioeconomic development.
Geneviève Dufour, Professor, University of Ottawa
Geneviève Dufour is a full time professor at the University of Ottawa's Civil Law Section and holds the Research Chair in Sustainable, Responsible and Inclusive Trade Law.
She collaborates with numerous players in international trade law, notably with various African governments in the context of WTO trade negotiations. In particular, she is leading a project to assess the normative scope of each human rights protection clause in free trade agreements.
She is also working to make government procurement more sustainable and inclusive by conducting comparative rights research. She has given over 140 lectures worldwide, produced over a hundred publications and organized more than 40 scientific events.
Amanda Elam, Research Fellow, Babson College
Dr. Elam serves as a Research Fellow at the award-winning Diana International Research Institute at Babson College where she conducts research on gender and entrepreneurship around the globe.
She serves on the editorial board of Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice and has published highly cited research in top business journals, technical reports, and edited volumes, including the well-lauded GEM Women’s Entrepreneurship report. Dr. Elam is also CEO/cofounder of Galaxy Diagnostics, an early-stage medical diagnostics company in North Carolina (USA) advancing diagnostics and clinical discovery for emerging infectious diseases linked to chronic illness, like Lyme disease and cat scratch disease.
In addition to her academic research and business leadership, Dr. Elam serves as a business advisor to a number of innovative life sciences startups, INGOs supporting women entrepreneurs, and appears regularly on panels and podiums at industry and global research conferences. She holds a doctorate in Sociology from UNC Chapel Hill.
Tatiana S. Manolova, Professor, Bentley University
Tatiana S. Manolova (DBA, Boston University) is a Professor of Management at Bentley University, USA.
Research interests include strategic management (competitive strategies for new and small companies), international entrepreneurship, and management in emerging economies.
She is a member of the Diana International Research Institute (DIRI), the premier global research institute dedicated to being the source of all research, policy, practitioner, and educator information for women’s entrepreneurship. Tatiana is the author of over 80 scholarly articles and book chapters, has co-authored two books, and has co-edited two compendia of research on women entrepreneurs published by Edward Elgar Publishing.
She is a Senior Editor for the International Journal of Emerging Markets, a Consulting Editor for the International Small Business Journal and the International Journal of Management Reviews, and serves on the editorial boards of Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, Journal of Business Venturing, and International Journal of Gender and Entrepreneurship.