Guangzhe Chen, a Chinese national, is the Global Director for the Transport Practice in the World Bank’s Infrastructure Practice Group.

As Global Director, Mr. Chen provides leadership in the formulation and implementation of World Bank  strategy and programs for sustainable road, urban, rail, logistics, water and air transport, and as well as key cross-cutting agenda such as road safety, climate adaptation/mitigation, gender, human capital development, disruptive technologies and financing. The Global Practice has a portfolio of approximately US$45 billion in more than 100 countries, and about 280 staff. From July 2019, in addition to his role as Global Director, Mr. Chen assumed the position of Regional Director for Infrastructure in South Asia region covering Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. In this capacity, Mr. Chen oversees the formulation and implementation of the Transport and Energy financing and knowledge programs in the region.

Prior to his current positions, Mr. Chen was the Senior Director for the World Bank’s Water Global Practice from October 2016 to October 2018. Before that he served as World Bank Country Director for Ethiopia, in Addis Ababa, and subsequently for Southern Africa, covering Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe, based in Pretoria. He started at the World Bank as a task team leader and then sector manager in the transport sector, followed by serving as a sector manager in the urban, water and disaster risk management.

An economist by training, Mr. Chen has over 25 years of international experience in the field of sustainable development, infrastructure finance and management with the World Bank Group and the Asian Development Bank.

Mr. Chen holds a graduate degree in Economics from Harvard University, USA, and B.A. in Economics from Zhongshan (Sun Yat-Sen) University, Guangzhou, China.