E3G-KAS Forum on Climate, Trade and Development Pathways

Dean of the UC San Diego School of Global Policy and Strategy, Caroline Freund is an expert in international trade and economic development.

Prior to joining GPS, she served as global director of Trade, Investment and Competitiveness at the World Bank. Freund also served as a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics. In addition, she has worked as chief economist for the Middle East and North Africa at the World Bank, after working for nearly a decade in the international trade unit of the research department. Freund began her career in the international finance division of the Federal Reserve Board and spent a year visiting the research department of the IMF.

The author of “Rich People Poor Countries: The Rise of Emerging Market Tycoons and their Mega Firms,” Freund was co-director of the World Bank’s flagship World Development Report 2020 on Global Value Chains. She has also published many articles on the effects of regional trade agreements and edited a volume on “The WTO and Reciprocal Preferential Trading Agreements.” Her work has appeared in academic journals, including: American Economic Review, Quarterly Journal of Economics, Review of Economics and Statistics, Journal of International Economics and Journal of Development Economics. 

Freund was also a member of the EXIM Bank advisory committee from 2014-16, and the scientific committees of CEPII (Institute for Research of the International Economy, Paris) and the Economic Research Forum (Cairo). She is a member of the Centre for Economic Policy Research and on the editorial board of the Economics and Politics journal.

Peter Young has a long and varied experience in EU trade policy. He is presently the Deputy Head of the Trade and Agriculture Section at the European Union Delegation to the United States in Washington DC. He took up this post in August 2020 and has the Diplomatic title of Minister Counsellor.

Prior to this assignment, he was a Senior Expert in the Directorate-General for Trade at the
European Commission in Brussels and was responsible for coordination and management of the EU’s trade relations with the United States.

Between 2013 and 2017, Peter Young was Deputy Head of Unit in DG Trade, managing the
EU’s trade relations with the Southern Mediterranean, Middle East and Gulf regions, a total of 19 countries and territories.

He was in particular responsible for advancing bilateral relations, conducting trade negotiations and ensuring satisfactory implementation of existing EU Trade Agreements with Algeria, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Morocco and the six member countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council.

Between 2010 and 2013, Peter Young was the Trade Counsellor at the European Union
Delegation to India in New Delhi.

Between 2007 and 2010, he was Deputy Head of Unit in DG Trade responsible for EU policy on Trade and Development, including the EU’s autonomous Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) scheme.

Between 2003 and 2007, he served as First Secretary at the EU Delegation to the WTO in
Geneva, representing the European Union in a number of WTO regular bodies and Doha
Development Agenda (DDA) negotiating groups.

Peter Young joined the European Commission, DG Trade, in April 1998, serving initially in
the Unit dealing with WTO affairs, where he was responsible notably for WTO accessions and EU policy on regional trade agreements.

Before joining the European Commission, Peter Young was Assistant Director (Head of Unit) in the United Kingdom Department of Trade and Industry. His career in UK Government service included a posting in Geneva as Second Secretary to the UK Mission to the GATT/WTO between 1992 and 1996.

He has worked on trade policy issues for the UK and then the EU almost continuously since
September 1989.