Brussels Forum Session: Part II: The World’s Largest Construction Project—Laying the Foundation at the London Donor Conference

Odile Renaud-Basso was elected the seventh president of EBRD on 2 November 2020 by the EBRD’s Board of Governors.She is the first-ever female head of a multilateral development bank. 

Prior to joining the EBRD, as director general at the French treasury, Renaud-Basso oversaw the development of France’s economic policies, taking the lead on European and international financial affairs, trade policies, financial regulation, and debt management. In this capacity she also served as vice president of the European Economic and Financial Committee, deputy to the G7/G20 groups, and French governor or alternate governor of the World Bank, the EBRD, and the African Development Bank. She was also chair of the Paris Club. 

Renaud-Basso is a graduate of the Paris Institut d’Etudes Politiques (Sciences Po) and an alumna of the Ecole Nationale d’Administration and Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.

Brussels Forum Session: US Elections in 2024: Politics, Support for Ukraine, and Challenges to Democracy

Ines Pohl has been Deutsche Welle (DW)'s Washington bureau chief since July 2020. She was previously DW's editor in chief from 2017 to 2020. During her three-year tenure, she focused on expanding DW's social media presence and exclusive journalistic offerings in all 32 broadcast languages. As a journalist, she is particularly interested in issues of democratic legitimacy and social transitions. She is passionate about human rights and the role of democratic structures in developing countries. She makes a strong case for using social networks to connect journalists and users.  

Pohl spent 2005 at Harvard University as a Nieman Fellow, exploring immigration, religion, and leadership. She is a member of the board of trustees of Reporters Without Borders and the advisory board of Youth Against AIDS. From 2009 to 2015, Pohl was editor in chief of the daily newspaper taz. During this time, she launched a weekend edition and revised www.taz.de, now one of the most widely used German news sites.

Brussels Forum Session: Building for the Future: A Green Marshall Plan for Ukraine   

Olena Pavlenko is president and co-founder of the Ukrainian think-tank DiXi Group and the Ukrainian Energy website. She leads a team of 17 people and has managed projects supported by USAID, the EU, OECD, the World Bank, and others. Pavlenko worked as a speechwriter for President Victor Yushchenko from 2005 to2008.  

Pavlenko has worked in the energy sector for more than 20 years, covering such issues as energy security, energy transparency, integration of the EU and Ukrainian energy markets, and open data in the energy sector. She also served as a non-staff advisor to the minister of energy and the minister of foreign affairs. 

Pavlenko is a deputy head of Ukraine’s EITI Multi-Stakeholder Group and was a global council chair of the PWYP global coalition from 2020 to 2022 and chair of the EU-UA Civil Society Platform in 2021-2022. She is an author of the brochure "Playing a Long Game: How Civil Society Can Lead Changes" about Ukraine's experience in EITI implementation for civil society organizations in other countries. 

After the full-scale invasion of Russia started, Pavlenko and her team joined the working group under the Ministry of Energy to help energy companies find replacements for damaged equipment. She and her team have also helped local communities to find generators and other equipment to remain resilient during power outages. She continues her advocacy work in support of the energy sector of Ukraine.