Lynn I. Alfalla is an International Trade Specialist, with the Foreign Agricultural Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture. She is a graduate of Columbus School of Law, Catholic University, with ten years experience in international trade, over seven in trade policy, all at FAS, an agency charged with improving export opportunities for U.S. agricultural products. She has been the country trade policy analyst for a number of countries throughout this time, covering China for the past four years and a half years. Other positions prior to FAS, included a stint as an assistant inspector general for the Navy, attorney, a legal writer and consumer advocate. As a senior staff member, she has reached out to junior staff seeking guidance and assistance in their careers.

Sonya Anderson currently is a full-time doctoral student about to begin her second year as the Harvard Graduate School of Education where she is concentrating in International Education within a policy and planning program. Prior to Harvard, Ms. Anderson was a Senior Associate at Creative Associates International, Inc (CAII) in Washington, DC (1998-2000). During her 2 years at CAII she worked as a trainer for a gender equity project in Benin, Haiti, and Morocco and as a girls' education consultant for a primary education reform project also in Benin. Sonya Anderson recently rejoined CAII for the summer to conduct an evaluation and prepare a case study report on the impact of the gender equity project in Benin and Haiti.

Prior to CAII, Ms. Anderson spent two years as the Ford Foundation (1996-1998) as a Program Associate working on a project to promote diversity on university campuses in the US and South Africa, and prior to the Ford Foundation, she was a high school teacher of French and social studies in Mississippi (1992-1994). Ms. Anderson has a M.Ed. in Administration, Planning, and Social Policy from Harvard University and a M.A. in International Affairs from the University of Ghana. She received a B.A. in Economics and Political Science from Yale University. Ms. Anderson is fluent in French.

Aruna Amirthanayagam is the Cultural Affairs Officer at the U.S. Embassy in Addis Ababa. Prior to his arrival in Ethiopia in August 2000, he was First Secretary for Economic Affairs at the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi. Mr. Amirthanayagam has also been posted as an Economic Officer in Haiti (1990-92) and the Philippines (1992-94). He was also Deputy Director for Mexico at the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) in Washington in 1995-96. Amirthanayagam was born in Colombo, Sri Lanka and educated in Sri Lanka, Britain, and the United States. He has a BA with Distinction in International Relations from Stamford University and an MBA in Finance and International Business from Cornell University. Before joining the Foreign Service, he worked for IBM in New York for 5 years in various financial assignments.

Mr. Amirthanayagam is married to Vathani, a Foreign Service Officer with USAID who is currently Population, Health, and Nutrition Chief at USAID Ethiopia. They have two children, a six-year-old son and a four-year-old daughter. His interests include cricket, squash, travel, and music.

Feleke Tadesse Assefa is a Policy Analyst with the US Department of State, a position he has held since September of 1999. Mr. Assefa has immersed himself in international affairs and has worked for some of the leading employers in the international arena such as United Airlines, the Office to the United States Trade Representative, the Department of State Transportation.

Feleke Tadesse Assefa received his J.D. from the University of Maryland. He attained a M.S. in Aviation from Central Missouri State University and a Bachelor of Science from St. Louis University. Mr. Assefa speaks Amharic and Kiswahili.

Bama Athreya is a Deputy Director with International Labor Rights Fund, a position she has held since October 2000 to the present. Previously, she served two years as Asia Program Director with the International Labor Rights Fund. Ms. Athreya was a Country Director in Phnom Penh, Cambodia with the American center for International Labor Solidarity from January 1996 until December 1997. She has also held several position with the Department of State in Jakarta, Indonesia, Washington DC and Taipei, Taiwan.

Ms. Athreya attained a M.A. in Cultural Anthropology from the University of Michigan. She received a B.A. in Comparative Literature from the University of Pennsylvania. She is fluent in Bahasa Indonesian, Mandarin Chinese and French and conversant in Spanish.

Holli C. Baker, FFD Assistant Manager, Food for Development Unit Africare. Holli Baker has been employed with Africare for two years, being recently promoted from Program Manager of the Francophone West Africa Region to the Food for Development Assistant Manager of the FFD Technical Unit in March 2001. Her responsibilities include providing financial and programmatic support to Africare's Food Security projects in Uganda, Mali, Burkina Faso, Chad, and Niger. Prior to joining Africare, Ms. Baker began a career in the Arts and has worked in U.S. museums including , The Art Institute of Chicago and the Smithsonian. She accepted an invitation to the U.S. Peace Corps in 1996 and served as a Public Health and TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) volunteer in Burkina Faso, West Africa. She has since continued with International Development and worked with organizations including the Mitchell Group and Peace Corps Headquarters, both based in Washington, DC.

Ms. Baker holds a B.A. from Northern Illinois University in Art History. She received a Business Management certificate through the Leadership Development Program for Minority Managers at Johns Hopkins University. She is proficient in French and is currently pursuing her M.B.A. at Johns Hopkins University (to be completed in May 2002). Ms. Baker resides in Washington D.C. and enjoys reading, painting, and travelling.

Wylita Bell currently serves as a Program Officer in the Fulbright Division at the Institute of International Education in New York. Prior to assuming her current position in January 2001, Ms. Bell was the Program Director of the International Visitor Program at the Georgia Council for International Visitors in Atlanta. She has also served as a Program Assistant with the Africa-America Institute's Division of Education. Ms. Bell received her B.A. in International Studies/Political Science from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She completed her Master of International Affairs degree as a Woodrow Wilson Fellow at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs. She is currently mentoring former interns who worked with her in Atlanta. Ms. Bell speaks French and Japanese.

Evelyn Y. Boyd is Director of International Trade Policy for Motorola's Broadband Communications Sector. Her assignment is to develop and coordinate the public policy component of expanding Motorola's broadband product offerings globally. Prior to her current assignment, she was Director of International Trade Policy, Latin America. Her responsibilities included coordinating trade policy positions and developing strategies to improve market access for Motorola products in the Latin America, the Caribbean and Canada. Before switching to Latin America, she served in the same position for Europe, Middle East Africa. She began her career at Motorola in 1991 lobbying telecommunications policy issues on Capitol Hill. Prior to joining Motorola, Ms. Boyd was Foreign Affairs Officer with the Bureau of International Communications and Information Policy, U.S. Department of State. She has also worked as a Professional Staff Member with the Senate Foreign Relations committee and as a National Security and International Affairs Analyst with the Senate Budget Committee. Before working for the Senate, she was an intern Project/Administrative Assistant in Dakar, Senegal for Africare, a non-profit development organization focusing on Africa.

Ms. Boyd holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Foreign Service from Georgetown University. She is proficient in French and is currently studying Spanish. She is a volunteer member of the Georgetown University Masters School of Foreign Service panel of examiners. Her hobbies are travelling, international folk art, gardening and genealogy.

John D. Brewer is Chief of the Financial Intelligence Unit located in the U.S. Treasury Department's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN). As Chief, he is responsible for planning and directing FinCEN efforts to establish systems worldwide to counter money laundering and other criminal activity through the sharing of resources and the exchange of financial information. Before joining the Treasury, Brewer was a Counterdrug Policy Advisor in the Office of Drug Enforcement Policy and Support at the Pentagon. He has also served in the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence & Research and on the staff of former U.S. Senator Wyche Fowler of Georgia.

Mr. Brewer is a native of Florence, South Carolina and a graduate of London School of Economics and Political Science and Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia. He has been a member of the Council on Foreign Relations since 1994.

Francisco Dóñez is a new Ph.D. student in the Energy and Resources at the University of California, Berkeley. Mr. Dóñez intends to undertake research on the vulnerability of communities to global climate change. From 1997 through summer 2001, Francisco worked at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in Washington, DC where he coordinated EPA's cooperative activities with the Mexican government in the area of climate change. He also participated actively in EPA's Hispanic Employment Program, for which he received recognition from Administrator Carol Browner in 1999. From 1992-1993, Francisco worked as an English teacher at the Science High School of Costa Rica, Central America. His previous academic work includes an S.B. degree in Mechanical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1991) and an M.S> in Public Policy from the Georgia Institute of Technology (1996). He is fluent in Spanish.

Grace Dzidzienyo has served for over three years as the International Business Development Administrator in the Office of Economic and Employment Development for the city of Durham, NC. She formulates the city's "International Business Development Strategic Plan", coordinates small business partnerships and serves as a liaison among Durham's international affiliates. Previously, she had served as the city's international representative to an acting city manager, a budget and a management analyst, and marketing/finance specialist with the city of Durham. She also lectured for over six years as an adjunct professor of government financial management, world civics, and American government at North Carolina Central University. She holds a BA in political science and a Masters of Public Administration from North Carolina Central University.

Grace Dzidzienyo is very active in both the local and international communities. Currently, she assists with development projects in African countries and works locally to develop motivational and self-esteem skills among the youth. She believes one must have both a career and personal goal. And her personal goal is her commitment to the elevation of those least represented.

Karl Hampton currently serves as the Small Farm Coordinator for the Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS). He is the International Trade Specialist in FAS's Trade Assistance Office where he is responsible for providing agricultural producers and businesses information and guidance on government programs and services, foreign markets and export opportunities for U.S. food and agricultural products. Prior to taking this position, Mr. Hampton served as U.S. Agricultural Attache to Brazil from 1992-96 where he promoted increased Brazilian consumption of U.S. food and agricultural products, and worked with government officials and companies to remove trade barriers to U.S. food products. Mr. Hampton also served as trade policy analyst for Western Europe, in the International Trade Policy Division, where he worked with the U.S. Trade Representative Office, USDA Agencies, U.S. companies and foreign government officials to remove sanitary and phyto-sanitary barriers to U.S. food and agricultural products. He worked as marketing specialist for USDA's non-profit trade organizations such as USA Rice Federation, U.S. Feed Grains Council and USA Dry Pea and Lentil Council; and served as world wheat analyst in the Grain and Feed Division. He served as the Assistant County Agent in Greenville, Mississippi with the MS Cooperative Extension System from 1985-1987.

Mr. Hampton is a graduate of Alcorn State University where he received his Master of Science in Agricultural Economics and Bachelor of Science in Agricultural Education. He also played collegiate football at Alcorn. Mr. Hampton has been with the Foreign Agricultural Service for 14 years. His travels for U.S. agriculture have taken him to India, Turkey, Pakistan. Belgium, France, Italy, Guatemala, Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, and Germany.

Jacqueline Hardware has worked at The Academy for Educational Development for the past three years. She is Program Officer for a global breastfeeding and maternal nutrition project. Previously, she was a Program Associate for an educational reform project in Haiti. A fluent French speaker, Ms. Hardware has also worked at the National Institute of Standards and Technology where she provided technical support to a technology and optical science program.

Ms. Hardware received an MS in International Business Management from the University of Maryland in College Park Maryland. She completed her BS in Business Administration with a minor in French from Columbia Union College in Takoma Park, Maryland. Ms. Hardware serves as a mentor for young women at The U.S. Dream Academy, as well. She provides limited technical assistance to the Africa Futures Forum.

Lily Ning Lee has worked nearly a year for the City of East Palo Alto, a low-income Latino and African-American community, on environmental cleanup for economic development. The previous four years, she served as Guam Program Manager for the Pacific Islands Team at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) in San Francisco. There Ms. Lee oversaw a $2 million annual budget supporting Guam EPA and coordinated technical assistance, Federal enforcement, and several Pacific Islands regional conferences. In Washington, D.C., she was Special Assistant to the USEPA Administrator (then Carol Browner) for Environmental Justice. As a policy analyst on Climate Change issues for USEPA, Lily Ning Lee coordinated an international team compiling methods for greenhouse gas emissions reductions and worked on the Zimbabwe Country Study. Ms. Lee also worked on immigration and other social issues for then-Congressman Norman Mineta.

Lily Ning Lee earned a B.A. in Physics from Princeton University and an M.S. in Energy and Resources from the University of California Berkeley. She speaks conversational Chinese (Mandarin). Currently she is mentoring an intern and a volunteer in East Palo Alto and she is a Board Member of the Environmental Leadership Program, a fellowship program.

LaTanya Mapp, Child Protection Officer UNICEF Addis Ababa has been employed with the United Nations Children's Fund since July 1996. LaTanya Mapp has been in the Addis office since July 1999 and will leave this position at the end of August 2001. Previous to joining UNICEF, she worked as an independent consultant to develop international programs both within and outside the US. The most significant work came from developing the African Law Initiative with the ABA, mobilizing African women NGOs at the Beijing Women's Conference for the MS Foundation, and promoting private businesses in international markets. She also had experience overseas working with a legal NGO in South Africa assisting new municipal governments draft legislation.

LaTanya Mapp graduated from law school in 1995 from the University of Maryland School of Law. She also has a master's degree in public management from the University of Maryland School of Public Affairs. Her B.A. is from the University of Maryland College Park in government and politics. Other educational achievements include a certificate in international law from the University of Nairobi and exposure to the French and Sestho languages. She is also a PPIA fellow.

Arlene Mayeda joined the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco in February 2001 after and eight-year career at the U.S. Department of Commerce. She is currently the country manager for Korea and Southeast Asia. She served as the USG staff led for the U.S.-Japan construction talks, which culminated in the successful negotiation of the 1994 Public Works Arrangements. She then joined the U.S. & Foreign Commercial Service and opened the Fresno Export Center, the first Commerce outreach office in the California Central Valley. With the onset of the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis, Arlene returned to headquarters to become the Department's APEC Affairs Coordinator. For the next two years, she served as the USG staff led on APEC discussions on e-commerce and SMFs, and supported the EVSL negotiations. After a brief stint on the China desk, Arlene became the Deputy Director of Public Affairs for the International Trade Administration (ITA). She served as the ITA spokesperson on a myriad of contentious trade issues, such as data privacy, hushkits, GMOs, and provided the critical back-up support to White House efforts to gain Congressional approval for China PNTR. She concluded her career at Commerce as the Senior Advisor to the Deputy Secretary where she facilitated the Secretary's oversight of the Department's day-to-day operation, including the transition.

Arlene is a graduate of SAIS ('93) and Harvard ('91). She speaks fluent Japanese, and has traveled extensively throughout Asia.

Kim Ninh has been the Assistant Director of the Governance, Law, and Civil Society Programs at the Asia Foundation since 1997, an international nonprofit organization headquartered in San Francisco with 14 field offices throughout Asia. She holds a Ph.D. in Political Science and an M.A. in International Relations from Yale University. She carried out dissertation research in Vietnam between 1991 and 1993 and was a research associate at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore in 1988-89. She has written numerous publications on politics, culture, and security issues in Southeast Asia, with a particular focus on Vietnam. She recently spent six months at the Australian National University as a Luce Postdoctoral Fellow. Her first book, A World Transformed: The Politics of Culture Revolutionary Vietnam, 1945-1965, is forthcoming from the University of Michigan Press.

Shalom'e Odokara is training specialist consultant with a World Group Bank based in Washington DC. In the past three years she has been involved in designing, implementing, and facilitating learning strategies and training programs for different World Bank departments and clients. Some of these programs have recognized with performance Award in World Bank Group. Shalom'e also consults on women, children, and human rights for the past twelve years. She has traveled extensively and completed many short-term program development and management assignments in Africa. Before coming to the World Bank Group, for eight years, she worked in West Africa, as director of an NGO-Women In Need, Inc, where her duties included overseeing the day to day running of the agencies, developing local grant making systems to support the micro credit program, advising ministry of women's affairs on human rights, developing a multi-track program including speakers programs, ally development strategies on lobbying support. Some of the regional programs she developed included mentoring young women professionals, setting up support system for displaced and abused women.

Shalom'e Odokara attained her BA in Economics with a minor in international studies from McPherson College, and her MA in Multi-cultural Psychology from Bowie.

Michael Orona was born in Tucson Arizona on March 30, 1970 and is of Native American and Latino ancestry. He received his undergraduate degree in Justice Studies and History from Northeastern Illinois University in Chicago and received a Ph.D. in International Development from Arbor University in Albuquerque, New Mexico and J.D. from Newport University. Dr. Orona is a former visiting legal scholar in Comparative Legal Studies from Cambridge University. Dr. Orona is currently employed in the position of International Program Analyst with the United States Department of Labor Bureau of International Labor Affairs in the International Child Labor Program (ICLP). The ICLP was created in 1993 in response to a direct request from Congress to investigate and report child labor abuses around the world. He presently supervises technical assistance projects in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Guatemala, and El Salvador.

Before moving to the Washington D.C. metropolitan area, Dr. Orona was employed in the position of Associate Researcher of Asian Affairs at the Wellspring Institute for Integral Studies (WIIS) in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Dr. Orona is also a former professor of U.S. foreign policy and international law at the Foreign Affairs College in Beijing, China. The college is under the direction of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and is dedicated to educating the next generation of Chinese diplomats. Dr. Orona currently resides in Arlington, Virginia with his wife Selena Trevino-Orona and their two-year-old son Octavio.

Anne Pham is a Program and Management Analyst at the U.S. Department of State. She serves as a Special Advisor/Assistant to the Chief Financial Officer and Executive Director of the Bureau of Financial Management and Policy. Ms. Pham has also worked as the Special Assistant to the Ambassador for War Crimes Issues in the Office of the Secretary from 1997-2001. Prior to her government service, Pham was a consultant at Samuels International Associates in Washington, D.C. from 1996-1997. From 1991-1995, Ms. Pham worked as a Refugee Coordinator and Interpreter at the Ithaca Refugee Assistance Program Office in New York. Ms. Pham has also served on the Executive Committee of the National Vietnamese-American Voters League since 1996.

Ms. Pham was born in Saigon, Vietnam, and came to the United States as a refugee in 1975. She received a Master of Science in Foreign Service Degree from the Georgetown School of Foreign Service in 1998 and a BA from Cornell University in 1994. She is a 1994 Woodrow Wilson Fellow for International Affairs and Public Policy.

Blaine D. Pope is a Senior Consultant with the New York City Department of Mental Health from September 1999 to present. Previously he was a Country Representative with Africare/Ethopia from 1995 to 1997. Mr. Pope was a Deputy Regional Manager, East Africare Unit for CARE International from1991 to1995. And he was a Consultant with Africare/Nigeria from 1989 to 1990. Additionally, Blaine Pope was a J. H. Robinson Fellow with Operation Crossroads Africa in Nigeria from 1988 to 1989.

Mr. Pope studied advanced Kiswahili at the University of Nairobi/Yale University (joint program) in Kenya in 1986. He holds a Master of Public Administration, and a Master of International Affairs from Columbia University. He attained his B.A. at the University of California at Berkeley. Blaine Pope is proficient in Kiswahili and Pidgin, and conversant in French, Amharic, Hausa, Yoruba, and Idoma.

Nathalie Rey is currently the Program Administrator for Columbia University Health Care, Inc. a new non-profit subsidiary organization at Columbia Presbyterian that provides health care in Upper Manhattan. During her three years of service, she has coordinated complex negotiations for the opening of a senior health care facility in Central Harlem, set up financial systems and has also worked on the organizational development of the cooperation. Prior to that, she was the Country Director of FOKAL's (The Open Society Institute - Haiti) Step by Step program for young children and their families from July 1996 to May 1998, where she launched several pilot schools throughout the country, trained teaching staff and parents in child-centered education and parent involvement and linked the health nutrition program to FOKAL's community development initiatives.

Nathalie Rey holds her Masters degree from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and her Bachelors from Columbia University specializing in international human rights law and development.

Russell F. Smith III is a senior attorney in the Policy, Legislation and Special Litigation Section of the Environment and Natural Resources Division of the United States Department of Justice. He has worked for the Department of Justice for six and a half years. In his current position he participates in the coordination of the Division's international work that primarily consists of matters that arise in two contexts: affirmative matters in which we seek to work with other countries to address, either directly or indirectly, pollution and natural resource issues that may affect the United States and its territories and the global commons; and defensive matters in which we seek to minimize or eliminate any adverse impact that U.S. international obligations and policies may have on federal agencies' ability to adopt or enforce environmental and natural resource laws and regulations.

Before joining the Department of Justice, Mr. Smith practiced law at the Washington, D.C. firm Spiegal & McDiarmid. His most memorable experiences include serving as an election observer for the first multiracial elections in South Africa and spending six months in Zambia as a research fellow following law school. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Yale University and a Juris Doctor from the University of Michigan.

Michelle Vaca-Senecal works to provide expert industry advice for national policymakers. In addition to industries (dolls, toys, games, sporting goods) and WTO Dispute Settlements, she also covers international trade in Latin America. Recent projects include (1) U.S. education as an export (2) Trade Liberalization (3) WTO Dispute Settlement Understanding (4) Mexico, Pricing of Prescription Drugs and (5) Sporting Goods, Economic Impact of U.S. Sanctions with Respect to Cuba. Prior to the USITC, Ms. Vaca-Senecal worked extensively as a paralegal for law firms and with non-profit organizations such as the Mexican-America Legal Defense and Education Fund (MALDEF) and Hispanic Association on Corporate Responsibility (HACR). At MALDEF she worked toward empowering Hispanics by advancing immigration issues, education, and voting rights. While at HACR she encouraged Fortune 500/1000 companies to promote qualified employees of color to higher management positions.

Ms. Vaca-Senecal earned her M.A. in International Commerce and Policy from George Mason University and was the recipient of her graduate program's David Ricardo Trade Award; she earned her B.A. in English from the University of Texas at San Antonio. She is an active member of Washington International Trade Association (WITA), Women in International Trade (WIIT), Toastmasters International, and Federal Women's Program.

Eric Wong is a Foreign Service Officer at the U.S. Department of State. Since June 2001, he has served on the Current Intelligence Staff of the Department's Bureau of Intelligence & Research (INR). Before joining INR, he was staff assistant to the Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs. From 1998 to 2000, Eric was a Vice Consul at the American Consulate General in Guangzhou, China. Before joining the Foreign Service in 1997, Eric worked on U.S.-Japan issues at Siegel Associates International. He also worked Asia-related projects for Hill & Knowlton International Economic Development Group and Edelman's International Public Affairs Group. Eric worked for the United Nations from 1989 to 1993, providing liaison to international NGOs through the UN Secretariat's NGO Resources Center. In 1993, he served with the UN peacekeeping mission in Somalia (UNOSOM II), as an information officer and deputy spokesman in Mogadishu.

Eric received his B.A. in 1989 from Yale University, and his M.I.A. from Columbia University's School of International & Public Affairs (SIPA) in 1995. At Columbia, he was an International Fellow, and served on the editorial board of the Journal of international Affairs. Eric has studied Mandarin, Cantonese, and French.