Rebeca Grynspan Mayufis

Rebeca Grynspan, economist and ex Vice President of , was unanimously chosen as the Latin American Secretary General on 24 February 2014 in Mexico City, by the 22 countries that form part of the Latin American Conference, starting her term of office on 1 April 2014. Before her appointment as the Latin American Secretary General, Mrs. Grynspan was a UN Under-Secretary-General and Associate Administrator of the Development Programme (UNDP), appointed by the Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on 1 February 2010. From 2006 to 2010 Mrs. Grynspan was Assistant Secretary General and Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean at the UNPD. Prior to this appointment she has been Director of the Subregional Headquarters in Mexico of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) from which she co-chaired the International Food Policy Research Institute’s Executive Board and took part in the advisory group for the PROLEAD Programme (supporting women’s leadership in Latin America) of the IADB. Before entering the SEGIB and the United Nations, Mrs. Grynspan was elected Vice President of Costa Rica, 1994-1998. She was also Minister for Housing, Minister Coordinator for Economic and Social Affairs during that same period and Deputy Minister for Finances for her country in Oscar Arias’ Government. As Vice President she coordinated the creation and implementation of the Task Force on Poverty from the Social Council within the framework of which she created the first programme aimed at female heads of households, a programme that became a Republic Law through at the initiative of the then MP Maria Lydia Sánchez. During her term in the UNDP (2010-2014) she was President of the GSIC (Gender Steering and Implementation Committee), a high level corporate mechanism commissioned with designing and ensuring implementation of the gender equality and parity strategy within the entire UNDP, from which she promoted the transversalization of gender equity in the organisation scheduling. She was also the spokesperson for gender before the UNDP Executive Board. She worked as a UN Representative on the Temporary Committee for the Reconstruction of Haiti (2010-2013), a board comprising Haitian government officials, the ex-President of the United States Bill Clinton and other high-level international partners. Since 1 May 2014, Rebeca Grynspan is the President of the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED). In addition to her experience as an adviser, lecturer and author, Mrs. Grynspan has been actively involved in key United Nations initiatives such as the Millennium Project’s Task Force on Poverty and Economic Development and on the High-Level Panel on Financing for Development. She is also a member of the International Advisory Group of the Think Tank Initiative of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC). She has worked with several governmental institutions, and national and international organisations as an adviser, consultant and researcher. Mrs. Grynspan is the author or co-author of numerous articles and books on social and economic policy, and on gender and poverty. Born in San José in Costa Rica, Mrs. Grynspan has a Master’s degree in Economics from the University of Sussex (United Kingdom).