Wessam El Beih

Regional Director, Middle East and North Africa, IDRC

Wessam is a creative team leader, who is passionate about social innovation and system change. She served as the representative of the Swiss private not-for-profit Drosos Foundation’s branch in Egypt since September 2014 and has been the director of the Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon portfolios since 2021. Wessam expanded the positioning of the Drosos Foundation in the region through entrepreneurship and innovation, creative economies and youth engagement programs to maximize inclusive social impact and sustainability. Prior to that, Wessam served with United Nations organizations in several positions, including as UNICEF’s chief of Global Fund Management in Somalia and UNAIDS country director in Egypt. In those roles, she led several groundbreaking initiatives and fostered strategic alliances to support underserved populations. She worked with CARE International as program manager and head of monitoring and evaluation, introducing interactive workplace learning and knowledge sharing across different countries in the Middle East and North Africa. With Abt Associates in the USA, she was a senior research analyst contributing to health policy research related to domestic and international projects. Wessam is a medical doctor with a master's degree in health systems management from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and she is certified in systems thinking from Cornell University, USA. She has 25 years of experience designing and managing development projects in HIV, health, gender, education, economic empowerment and entrepreneurship.