GUESTS
Thomas C. Barry
President and CEO, Zephyr Management, L.P., New York, United States
Thomas C. Barry is the President and CEO of Zephyr Management, L.P., an emerging markets investment management company which he founded in 1994. Zephyr sponsored thirteen specialized investment funds with approximately US $2 billion in committed capital. Zephyr Management has sponsored discrete funds for private equity investing in Africa, Mexico, Korea, and India.
Zephyr’s marketable securities funds invest in stock markets of developing countries. Prior to founding Zephyr, Mr. Barry was President and CEO of Rockefeller & Co., the investment management arm of the Rockefeller family, from 1983 to 1993. Previously, Mr. Barry was employed by T. Rowe Price Associates, Inc. from 1969 to 1982.
He received an MBA from Harvard Business School in 1969 and an undergraduate degree from Yale University in 1966 where he majored in Latin American Studies. He is a Chartered Financial Analyst.
Her Excellency Ameenah Gurib-Fakim
Professor and First Female President of Mauritius
Her Excellency Ameenah Gurib-Fakim served as the first female president of Mauritius from 2015 to 2018. Prior to the presidency, Dr. Gurib-Fakim was the Managing Director of the Centre International de Développement Pharmaceutique (CIDP) Research and Innovation as well as Professor of Organic Chemistry with an endowed chair at the University of Mauritius. From 2001, she served successively as Dean of the Faculty of Science and Pro Vice Chancellor.
She has participated in several consultation meetings on environmental issues organized by international organizations such as the World Bank, SIDA, CIDA, EU and UN amongst others. Between 2011 and 2013, she was elected and served as Chairperson of the International Council for Scientific Union – Regional Office for Africa. She has authored and/or co-edited 28 books and several book chapters and scientific articles in the field of biodiversity conservation and sustainable development. Dr. Gurib-Fakim earned a BSc in Chemistry from the University of Surrey, UK (1983), and a PhD from the University of Exeter (1987). Dr. Gurib-Fakim was elevated to the Order of the Commander of the Star and Key by the Government of Mauritius in 2008.
She was admitted to the Order of the Chevalier de L’Ordre des Palmes Académiques by the Government of France in 2010. Her Excellency received a Doctor of Science (DSc), honoris causa, from the Université Pierre et Marie Curie (Sorbonne Université), Paris, France in 2013 and from Greenwich University Pakistan in 2015.
Dr. Irvin Studin
President of the Institute for 21st Century Questions, Toronto, Canada
Dr. Irvin Studin is Editor-in-Chief and Publisher of Global Brief magazine, President of the Institute for 21st Century Questions, and Chair of the Worldwide Commission to Educate All Kids (Post-Pandemic). A past Rhodes Scholar, he has been called one of the leading international policy thinkers and strategists of his generation. Dr. Studin is with the Chaire Raoul-Dandurand at the Université du Québec à Montreal (UQAM), and has been a professor of public policy in leading universities and policy schools in North America, Asia, and Europe.
Dr. Studin worked for a number of years in the Privy Council Office (Prime Minister’s department) in Ottawa, as well as in the Australian Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet in Canberra. He was an appointed member of the first-ever external advisory board of the Canadian Foreign Service Institute, Canada’s diplomatic academy, charged with preparing Canada’s diplomats for the challenges of this century. The first-ever recruit of the Canadian government’s Recruitment of Policy Leaders program, he was a member of the small team that wrote Canada’s 2004 national security policy (the country’s first), and he principal-authored Australia’s 2006 national counter-terrorism policy.
He holds degrees from the Schulich School of Business (York University), the London School of Economics, and the University of Oxford, where he studied on a Rhodes Scholarship. His PhD is from Osgoode Hall Law School, where he was a Trudeau Scholar and won the Governor-General’s Gold Medal.
Dr. Rohinton P. Medhora
Professor of Practice at the Institute for the Study of International Development at McGill University
Dr. Rohinton P. Medhora is Professor of Practice at the Institute for the Study of International Development at McGill University, Montreal, Canada and a former president of the Centre for International Governance Innovation in Waterloo, Canada where he remains a Distinguished Fellow. Previously, he was vice president of programs at Canada’s International Development Research Centre. His fields of expertise are international economic relations, innovation policy, and development economics.
Rohinton sits on the board of several non-profit organizations. He was a member of the Commission on Global Economic Transformation and The Lancet and Financial Times Commission on Governing Health Futures 2030, and is a founding member of its successor the Digital Transformations for Health Lab at the University of Geneva. In 2021-22 he chaired the Ontario Workplace Recovery Advisory Committee.
Rohinton received his doctorate in economics in 1988 from the University of Toronto, where he subsequently taught. He has published extensively in professional and non-technical journals and has produced several books including co-editing International Development: Ideas, Experience, and Prospects (Oxford University Press). In May 2025 he produced a three-part video series on the governance of new technologies with the Institute for New Economic Thinking in New York.
Anabel González
Vice President for Countries, Inter-American Development Bank, Washington, D.C., United States
Prior to joining the IDB, Anabel González served as Deputy Director-General at the World Trade Organization (WTO). During this time, she facilitated trade negotiations among WTO members, including on trade-related aspects of the pandemic. She also oversaw the divisions of economic research, market access, services trade and investment, and intellectual property.
Ms. González’s professional trajectory includes serving as Senior Director of the World Bank’s Global Practice on Trade & Competitiveness (2014-2017). Ms. González has extensive public sector experience in the government of Costa Rica. As Minister of Trade in 2010-2014, she played a key role in the country´s pursuit to join the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), negotiated major free trade agreements and contributed to attracting numerous investment projects. She also served as president of PROCOMER (export promotion board). Previously, Ms. González served as Special Ambassador and Chief Negotiator (2002-2004), Vice-Minister (1998-2001), and Director General for Trade Negotiations (1991-1997).
Additionally, she worked as Director-General of CINDE, a non-profit investment promotion agency, between (2001-2002). Ms. González has written extensively on trade, investment and economic development, and has presented in over 70 countries across the world. She holds a Master’s degree in Law from Georgetown University, and a Law degree from the University of Costa Rica.
Dr. Patrick Utomi
President/CEO, Centre for Values in Leadership, Lagos, Nigeria
Dr. Pat Utomi is a recognized Nigerian political economist and management expert. A senior fellow of the Institute of Management Consultants of Nigeria and a former presidential candidate, he has served at the highest levels in public offices, the private sector, as well as in academia – including as a professor at the Lagos Business School. He served in senior positions in government, as an Adviser to the President of Nigeria, and in the private sector, as Chief Operating Officer for Volkswagen of Nigeria. He is the founder of Centre for Values in leadership (CVL), a social enterprise organization dedicated to empowering Nigerians to make lasting contributions in areas of business, public life, and civil society. Dr. Utomi is the current Chair of the African Union’s Pan-African Private Sector Trade and Investment Committee (PAFTRAC). He has been a scholar-in-residence at the Harvard Business School and the American University in Washington, D.C. Dr. Utomi received his PhD, MPA, and MA from Indiana University, Bloomington, United States.