Who's who in #globaldev: May 2022 executive appointments
Australia has appointed new ministers to head up its international development portfolio after the Labor Party won a majority in the country's federal election during a month filled with job moves, from the United Nations to global health and academia.
By David Ainsworth // 01 June 2022Australia has appointed new ministers to head up its international development portfolio, after the Labor Party won a majority in the country’s recent federal election. Pat Conroy, a member of Parliament representing Shortland, announced on Twitter that he will become the minister for international development and the Pacific, as well as the defense industry minister. Penny Wong, a senator for South Australia, has been appointed minister for foreign affairs. Those are just two examples from a range of job moves, leadership changes, and executive appointments in the month of May. United Nations The United Nations Office of Project Services announced the resignation of Executive Director Grete Faremo on May 8, following critical news coverage of Sustainable Investments in Infrastructure and Innovation, a UNOPS impact-investing initiative. Jens Wandel has been appointed as acting executive director. Catherine Kyobutungi, the executive director of the African Population and Health Research Center, has been appointed to the council of the United Nations University. Finance Alistair Thomson will take over as head of innovation and change at the International Monetary Fund in August. Thomson is currently IMF’s chief of media relations. Zeynep Kantur Ozenci is becoming the global sector manager for health and education at the International Finance Corporation. Richard Threlfall is stepping back from his role as KPMG International’s global head of infrastructure. He will instead focus on his position as global head of KPMG IMPACT, the accelerator for KPMG’s environmental, social, and governance work. Gavin Wilson has been named CEO at DAI Capital, the investment banking arm of development organization DAI. Wilson has previously worked at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and the World Bank. Civil society Phyllis Kurlander Costanza is leaving the UBS Optimus Foundation, the philanthropic arm of financial services company UBS, “to pioneer … a market for social outcome credits,” according to a LinkedIn post. Tom Hall takes over as head of social impact at UBS and Maya Ziswiler as CEO at the foundation. Pact announced the appointment of three new board members: Carolina Rojas-Hayes, James Donovan, and Tewodros Melesse. Katie LaRoque is moving from InterAction to Freedom House to serve as deputy director for policy and advocacy. The Open Society Foundations welcomed Laura Carvalho as the organization’s first global director of equity. Carvalho, a Brazilian economist, is co-founder and director of the Research Center on Macroeconomics of Inequalities at the University of São Paulo and an associate professor of macroeconomics. Academia Antonio Andreoni is joining the School of Oriental and African Studies as professor of development economics. Andreoni is currently associate professor of industrial economics at University College London. Marco Roscini has been appointed as Swiss chair of international humanitarian law at the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights. Roscini is a professor of international law at the University of Westminster in London. Jorge Osorio was named as the next director of the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s Global Health Institute. Osorio is currently a professor of pathobiological sciences in the university’s School of Veterinary Medicine. Global health The member states of the World Health Organization have reelected Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus to serve a second five-year term as director-general. His reelection was confirmed during the 75th World Health Assembly in Geneva. He was the sole candidate. John Nkengasong, the inaugural director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, has been confirmed to lead the U.S. President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief as coordinator of the government’s activities to combat HIV/AIDS globally. Ahmed Ogwell Ouma, who has been a deputy director at Africa CDC, will serve as the agency’s acting director in Nkengasong’s absence. The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations has announced a series of high-level appointments. Richard Hatchett will serve as CEO for a second five-year term. Also, five new members are joining its board: L. Rizka Andalucia, Cyrus Ardalan, Githinji Gitahi, Samba Sow, and Anita Zaidi. Alice Bell is joining Wellcome as head of climate and health policy. She spent more than seven years at Possible, a climate action nonprofit based in the U.K. Richard Mihigo joined Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance as the director of COVID-19 delivery, coordination, and integration for the international COVAX initiative. Climate Sixteen experts and world leaders — including Pascal Lamy, former World Trade Organization chief; Jamshyd Godrej, board chair at the Council on Energy, Environment and Water; and Agnes Kalibata, president of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa — were named as members of the Climate Overshoot Commission. The Global Methane Hub named Patty Rhee as its new chief partnerships officer; Alfonso Galarce as chief administrative and financial officer; and Alexander Ege, Carolina Urmenta, and Hayden Montgomery as program officers. United States Cary Fowler has become the U.S. government’s global food security envoy — a role that hasn’t existed since 2016 — as the war in Ukraine threatens the world’s food supplies. Beth Tritter was named as the director of a COVID-19 vaccine access and delivery initiative at the U.S. Agency for International Development, while Sarah Rose has joined USAID as a senior adviser for localization. Former U.S. Sen. Chris Dodd and former Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell have been appointed as special advisers for the Summit of the Americas, a gathering of leaders from the American continents. United Kingdom Sally Langrish was appointed as legal adviser at Britain’s Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office. After originally joining the Foreign & Commonwealth Office in 1995, she went on to hold a number of roles in the government, most recently as legal director at the U.K. Department for International Trade.
Australia has appointed new ministers to head up its international development portfolio, after the Labor Party won a majority in the country’s recent federal election.
Pat Conroy, a member of Parliament representing Shortland, announced on Twitter that he will become the minister for international development and the Pacific, as well as the defense industry minister.
Penny Wong, a senator for South Australia, has been appointed minister for foreign affairs.
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David Ainsworth is business editor at Devex, where he writes about finance and funding issues for development institutions. He was previously a senior writer and editor for magazines specializing in nonprofits in the U.K. and worked as a policy and communications specialist in the nonprofit sector for a number of years. His team specializes in understanding reports and data and what it teaches us about how development functions.