Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
Executive Director of ISTIA, the International Services Trade Information Agency (ISTIA), a Geneva-based agency founded to help WTO Member governments build capacity in collection and use of services trade data for negotiations. Training also for data users, being negotiators and policymakers. ISTIA's current foci comprises : WTO Services Statistics Capacity Building and 'LDC Services Waiver' work, post-Bali, objective of assisting WTO Members to improve capacity in collection and use of enhanced services trade data - principally as part of national accounts collection. ISTIA has hosted WTO Expert Group meeting at the 5th WTO Ministerial Meeting, Hong Kong, and collaboratew with the OECD, UN and WTO meetings. Ms. Powell's professional focus is policy and statistics for foreign direct investment (FDI) and services-trade. She was a United Nations (Economic Affairs Officer), during which time she undertook various secondments at the World Trade Organization, (WTO Trade Policy Training, Accessions and Market Access), World Health Organization and for various field-based USAID projects. During her tenure at UNCTAD, she worked as a principal staff member of the UN World Investment Report team drafting sections related to FDI trends and policy. During this time, she also designed and developed the current UN FDI-TNC database, and trained all new statistical staff in the basics of foreign direct investment and transnational corporations. Prior to working in the international organizations, Ms. Powell was a New Product Engineeer at Hewlett Packard and Wavefront Technologies. Ms. Powell wrote her master thesis at the Norwegian School of Economics (NHH, Bergen, Norway) on reducing the time to market vis-a-vis concurrent engineering, for HP's Global Workstation Manufacturing Business. Ms. Powell holds a master degree from the Norwegian School of Economics, a B.S. in computer engineering (UC Santa Barbara, 1990) and a B.A. in Sociology (UC Santa Barbara, 1990).
Main Representative to the World Bank and IMF for ISTIA. ISTIA is an accredited NGO to the World Bank and IMF since November 2022.
Main Representative to the World Trade Organization (WTO) for ISTIA. ISTIA is an accredited NGO to the WTO since July 2017.
Founded ISTIA: Executive Director and Founder of International Services Trade Information Agency - International Agency based in Geneva, Switzerland http://www.servicestrade.org (ISTIA), the International Services Trade Information Agency. Mandate of the new organization is to provide services trade statistics capacity building to WTO Member governments. On a functional basis, ISTIA’s principal activities transpire at the national-level of governments, and these are two-fold: (1) Statistical training: Provision of technical assistance to national entities involved in collection of cross-border trade-in-services and foreign-direct-investment (FDI) data; comprising National Statistical Offices, Ministries of Finance, Central Banks) and (2) Policymaker training: Training of negotiators and policymakers such that they are able to use the new dataset of globalization information, in the context of multilateral (WTO GATS) and other contexts, such as bilateral or plurilateral fora. (3) Other activities: Cross-coordination of ISTIA work with international organisations, expert groups, research and academic institutions, and the private sector. Organized a Board of Directors, comprising a group of high-stature distinguished individuals (Ambassadors, Ministers, UN and WTO officials) for Board of Directors for new organization. Conducted liaisonship with Swiss authorities to follow legal procedure for foundation of new international NGO/ONG. Donor fundraising activities. Conducted strategic planning. Program planning and management, fundraising, activities. Developed donor relations. Built strategic partnerships with national statistical agencies, international organisations and research institutions. Developed training materials and documentation for course provision. Development of materials for awareness-raising and donor fund-raising. Researched Planning and carrying out research assignments related to the field of trade-in-services statistics.
Provided training to local private sector actors on policy, law and business implications for France and French business vis-à-vis needs to forward DIGITAL SOVEREIGNTY in the 21st century. Provided training to local private sector actors on policy, law and business implications for France and French business vis-à-vis needs to forward DIGITAL SOVEREIGNTY in the 21st century. Skills: Policy Analysis · Public Speaking · Law · Technology Policy, French Senate
Main Representative to UN-ECOSOC (United Nations Economic and Social Commission) for an NGO in Bangladesh. Represented the NGO before the UN Human Rights Council, the UN Commission on the Status of Women, and the UN Treaty Bodies, also the UN General Assembly. Attends meetings in Geneva, makes oral and written reports to the UN-Human Rights Council, UN-ECOSOC, UN Commission on the State of Women, UN High Level meeting on the Rights of the Child, other meetings on activities of the NGO in Bangladesh, in light of the UN-SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals). Also being Main UN-ECOSOC Representative to the UN-HQ in New York (UN General Assembly) and UNOV- UN Office at Vienna.
Represented Aid Organization before UN meetings in Geneva, including the UN ECOSOC, UN Human Rights Council, UN High-Level Meeting on the Convention of Rights of the Child, drafted position papers, provided inputs to the home-office. Provided assistance to Bangladesh-based efforts to provide relief to poor citizens of Bangladesh through employment training, educational efforts to inhibit early-child marriage, provision of bank accounts to needy youth, legal services to domestic-abuse survivors.
ECONOMIC AFFAIRS OFFICER, UNITED NATIONS, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND. FDI Capacity Building. Provision of courses to new statisticians in UN World Investment Report group, and to national government officials, on ad hoc basis. Development of materials for training courses. Development of new projects. Donor fundraising for new projects. Mergers and acquisitions analyses. Analyses of mergers and acquisitions as source of insight into future FDI data movements. Obtention of data from various sources, usually consulting firms or private-sector databases. FDI Database. Designed and developed the informatics structure for the database in-use for FDI team, using OLAP (online analytical process) system. Trained new statisticians on data-set structure and how to use new software. Project-managed implementation of new system in UNCTAD Geneva office. FDI Policy and Statistical Trends Analysis. Performance of analysis of countries, regions and economic areas. Gathering of research materials. Assembly of data. Drafting of reports for UN management and drafting of sections of various official reports and documents. Specialized area: Foreign direct investment policy and foreign direct investment statistical nomenclature. Drafting official documents. Provided inputs to various official documents such as the UN World Investment Report and UN World Investment Directory series. UN meeting coordination. Conference planning, invitation of high-level personalities from national governments and the private sector for participation in UN meetings related to FDI policy, Technology Policy and Trade. Management. Management of new staff members and interns.