38 Facts About Josette Sheeran

Josette Sheeran served in the United States Department of State as Under Secretary of State for Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice covering Economic Growth, Energy, Technology, Agriculture and the Environment, with the rank of Ambassador.

Josette Sheeran currently serves as founder and CEO of Firefly Global Group, a geopolitical and business consulting firm, supporting founders and accelerating new technologies which enhance national and human security.

Josette Sheeran was the United Nations's Special Envoy for Haiti, successfully leading efforts to end a devastating cholera epidemic there.

Josette Sheeran is former Vice Chair of the World Economic Forum.

Josette Sheeran was the eleventh Executive Director of the UN World Food Programme, appointed by United Nations Secretary-General, leading the world's biggest humanitarian supply chains delivering over 20 billion meals a year to war and disaster zones.

Josette Sheeran served as the seventh president and CEO of Asia Society from 2013 to 2020.

Josette Sheeran was the United Nations's Special Envoy for Haiti, successfully leading efforts to end a devastating cholera epidemic there.

Josette Sheeran served as a diplomat and negotiator for the United States, and was unanimously confirmed by the Senate twice.

Josette Sheeran was appointed coordinator of the Pakistan earthquake response by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and developed economic recovery plans for front line areas in Pakistan, Afghanistan and beyond.

Josette Sheeran has served on the boards of OPIC, and the Millennium Challenge Corporation; US Representative to UNESCO, as well as the lead US representative to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation and the OECD.

Josette Sheeran was born in Orange, New Jersey, and is one of six siblings.

Josette Sheeran earned a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Colorado at Boulder in 1976.

Josette Sheeran led WFP in diversifying its donor base to more than 100 nations and became the first UN program to include the so-called BRIC countries and the Gulf States among its top 10 donors, she increased private sector partnerships 10 fold to around $100 million a year.

Josette Sheeran instituted key reforms to reduce dependency on food aid among millions of aid recipients.

Josette Sheeran expressed commitment to meeting the UN Millennium Development Goal of halving hunger and poverty by 2015.

In January 2009, Josette Sheeran called on the government of Israel to allow more UN food aid to the people in Gaza during the conflict there.

Josette Sheeran's influential TED Talk on ending world hunger has been viewed more than one million times and has been used in schools to teach children about ending hunger through innovation and partnerships.

Josette Sheeran chaired the UN High Level Committee on Management for two terms, leading more than 40 UN entities in a series of historic reforms, from the adoption of International Public Accounting Standards, to enacting world-class agreements on transparency, ethics, whistle-blowing, financial disclosure and technology.

In January 2012, Josette Sheeran announced that she would assume the role of Vice Chairman of the World Economic Forum upon completing her term at WFP in 2012.

Josette Sheeran served as the UN Special Envoy to Haiti, appointed on June 20,2017, representing UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres in advancing Haiti's transition from an aid-dependent economy, at the end of more than 17 years of UN peace-keeping operations.

Josette Sheeran was responsible for a range of economic issues including: development, trade, agriculture, finance, energy, telecommunications and transportation.

Josette Sheeran helped foster and carry out aid and development initiatives in countries like China, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Lebanon.

Josette Sheeran served as the Foreign Affairs Sous-Sherpa on behalf of the President of the United States at the Group of Eight Summit.

Josette Sheeran headed a host of high-level bilateral or multilateral economic dialogues with the European Union, China, India, Japan, Iraq, Afghanistan, and many others.

Josette Sheeran was named by former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan along with Prime Ministers Luisa Dias Diogo, Prime Minister of Mozambique; Jens Stoltenberg, Prime Minister of Norway; and Shaukat Aziz, Prime Minister of Pakistan, to the High Level Panel on System-Wide Coherence.

Josette Sheeran represented the United States at a wide variety of high-level bilateral and multilateral meetings, serving as Alternative Governor for the World Bank; the Inter-American Development Bank; the African Development Bank; the Asian Development Bank; and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

Josette Sheeran helped bring to a successful conclusion the landmark US-Australia Free Trade Agreement, which is expected to increase US exports to Australia by $2 billion a year.

Josette Sheeran led trade enforcement negotiations with China and furthered US trade and investment interests in direct talks with Japan, Korea, India and many other nations.

Josette Sheeran served as President and Chief Executive Officer of Empower America, where she developed its agenda of trade policy, technology policy, education reform, and tax reform, and advancing the agenda of Empowerment Economics to transform America's poorest cities and regions under the leadership of Jack Kemp and Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick.

Josette Sheeran got her start in journalism in 1976 with the New York News World, which was owned by News World Communications, an international media conglomerate owned by the Unification Church, of which she was a longtime member.

Josette Sheeran served in a number of capacities for News World, eventually becoming their White House correspondent.

Josette Sheeran wrote a nationally syndicated column for Scripps Howard News Service.

Josette Sheeran has had interviews with more than a dozen heads of state in Europe, Asia, Latin America and the United States, most famously her interview with North Korean head of state Kim Il Sung.

Josette Sheeran has twice served as a Pulitzer Prize juror.

Ambassador Josette Sheeran serves on the boards of Capital Group funds, which manages more than $2.5 trillion in global investments; Vestergaard International, which has delivered 1 billion high tech nets to prevent deaths from malaria; Lifestraw, a pioneer in access to safe water; Sceye, the world's first stationary stratospheric vessel and the Business Council for International Understanding.

Josette Sheeran is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Josette Sheeran was a Fisher Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School Belfer Center in 2013.

Josette Sheeran graduated from the University of Colorado and has been awarded numerous honorary doctorate degrees, including from Michigan State University and the University of Colorado.