The World Economic Forum has just announced that it has appointed Martina Viarengo, Assistant Professor in the Economics Department at the Institute, as a member of its World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Women's Empowerment.

The Council on Women’s Empowerment seeks to serve as a central source of scientific evidence for closing gender gaps. Its mission is to gather the fragmented information on successful practices, programmes and policies, stimulate and support new research, and consolidate these findings.

The World Economic Forum has a network of 80 Global Agenda Councils, comprising relevant thought leaders from academia, government, business and other fields to capture the best knowledge on each key issue and integrate it into global collaboration and decision-making processes.

Martina Viarengo joins the ranks of several Institute Professors who have served on Global Agenda Councils such as Richard Baldwin who was appointed to the Global Trade System Council; Andrea Bianchi, Terrorism Council; Pierre-Marie Dupuy and Emeritus Professor Georges Abi-Saab, International Legal System; and Andrew Clapham, Human Rights.
Previously Professor Viarengo co-authored the publication “The Dynamics of the Gender Gap: how do countries rank in terms of making marriage and motherhood compatible with Work?” that was published in the Global Gender Gap Report 2009 by the World Economic Forum.

Martina Viarengo's research focuses on gender gaps in education and labor market outcomes in an international perspective. She has examined the effect of policies adopted to promote gender equality and women's empowerment with a particular focus on developing countries.