Former New Zealand Deputy Secretary for International Development, UN Ambassador and the first woman to lead NZAID, Amanda Ellis now works with philanthropist Julie Wrigley as Senior Director of the Arizona State University Wrigley Global Futures Laboratory. She serves as co-chair for the WE (Women Entrepreneurs) Empower UN SDG Challenge.
With a long history working to promote gender equality, Ms. Ellis served as NZ’s inaugural Ambassador for Women and Girls, co-founded the Global Banking Alliance for Women, and at the World Bank Group (2003-10) founded the IFC global gender group, led the President's Global Private Sector CEO Leaders Forum to promote women’s economic empowerment and the research project that created Women, Business and the Law.
Author of two best-selling Random House books on women in business, five research titles on gender and economic growth in the World Bank Directions in Development series and co-author of the Gender Equality and Governance Index, Ms. Ellis is the recipient of the TIAW Lifetime Achievement Award for services to women’s economic empowerment.
