TINA Advisory Board

On 22 August 2023, for the 7th mandate of the Royal Government of Cambodia, Dr SOK Siphana was appointed as a full-fledged cabinet member as Senior Minister in charge of Special Missions (Multilateral Trade and Economic Affairs). In addition to his portfolio as Senior Minister, he was appointed as the Chairman of the Trade Policy Advisory Board in February 2024. Previously, he was appointed by former Prime Minister Samdech Techo HUN Sen as Advisor to the Royal Government of Cambodia with a rank of Minister in August 2009 attached concurrently with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, the Supreme National Economic Council (SNEC), and the Council for the Development of Cambodia (CDC). Subsequently in September 2018, he was reappointed as Senior Advisor with a rank of Senior Minister.

From 2010 to August 2023, he was a practicing attorney and the Founding Partner of SokSiphana&associates, a law and consulting firm specialized in international trade and corporate law in Phnom Penh. He serves currently as the Emeritus Chairman of the Board of the Asian Vision Institute (AVI), having led the organization since 2019 as its chairman. From 2011 to 2017, he served as Chairman of the Cambodia Development Resource Institute (CDRI), Cambodia’s oldest and prominent independent research institute.

From 1999 to 2005, he served as Secretary of State at the Ministry of Commerce, where he acted as the lead negotiator in Cambodia’s accession to the WTO. From October 2005 to July 2009, he served as Director at the International Trade Center (ITC), a joint technical agency of UNCTAD and WTO in Geneva, Switzerland. From 1993-1998, he was the legal expert for the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) attached to the Council for the Development of Cambodia.

Dr SOK is holder of a Juris Doctor (J.D.) from Widener University School of Law in Delaware, United States (1992), a Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) from Bond University School of Law in Queensland, Australia (2009), and a “Docteur en Droit” from the Université de Paris II Panthéon-Assas, Paris, France (2022). In 13 October 2022, His Majesty The King has bestowed him a lifetime Royal Title of “Bundit Sapheacha” (Academician) at the Royal Academy of Cambodia as well as in 20 July 2023 a full Professorship.

Career wise at the service of Cambodian diplomacy, Dr SOK was attached since 2011 to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, H.E. Hor Namhong followed by H.E. Prak Sokhonn, where he served, among other advisory functions, the following: during Cambodia Chairmanship of ASEAN in 2012, as Member of the ASEAN Task Force on Substantive Issues, ASEAN India Eminent Person Group Co-Chair, Cambodian Sherpa to G20 and High Level Cambodian Representative to G20 Development Working Group. For Cambodia Chairmanship of ASEAN in 2022, he was appointed as Chair of the National Sub-Committee on Substances and Documentation and a G20 Sherpa. Since 2011, he acted as ASEM SOM and was entrusted with the responsibility of organizing Cambodia’s hosting of the 13th ASEM Summit in 2020. He acted also as SOM for the Asian Cooperation Dialogue (ACD), the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA), and for all the Mekong Cooperation initiatives, including Mekong-Japan, Mekong-ROK, Mekong-Ganga, Mekong-Lancang, Lower Mekong Initiative (LMI), ACMECS, as well as serving as the Chairman of the Mekong-Lancang Special Fund. From 2011 to 2018, he was also a Convenor of a weekly 45 minutes “Cambodia’s Global Dialogue” policy talk show at South East Asia TV (SEATV).

Ambassador Xolelwa Mlumbi-Peter holds a B.Com Honours Degree in Economics from Rhodes University, Grahamstown. She has also completed a Trade Policy Course at Harvard University and a Leadership Course for Women in Africa at Yale University. Additionally, she has undergone mediation training with the Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution in London and holds a Master of Business Administration from the University of Johannesburg.

In her professional career, Ambassador Mlumbi-Peter served as South Africa’s Chief Negotiator and Deputy Director-General (DDG) in the International Trade and Economic Development Division of the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition (the dtic) from 2011 to 2019. During this time, she led trade negotiations with various partners, including the European Union, UK, and Mercosur. She also played a key role in regional and African continental trade engagements. From May 2019 to October 2023, she served as South Africa’s Permanent Representative to the World Trade Organisation (WTO), advocating for the development agenda and negotiating positions. She returned to the dtic in October 2023 as the DDG responsible for the Trade Branch.

Ambassador Mlumbi-Peter’s career began in the public sector at the National Treasury before joining the dtic. She has also worked in the financial services industry and is an accredited Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution Mediator.

Dr. Deborah Elms is Head of Trade Policy at the Hinrich Foundation in Singapore. Prior to joining the Foundation, she was the Executive Director and Founder of the Asian Trade Centre (ATC). She was also President of the Asia Business Trade Association (ABTA) and the Board Director of the Asian Trade Centre Foundation (ATCF).

Dr. Elms serves on the board of the Trade and Investment Negotiation Adviser (TINA) at the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia Pacific (UNESCAP). She was on the International Advisory Council for APCO (2021-2023) and was a member of the International Technical Advisory Committee of the Global Trade Professionals Alliance and Chair of the Working Group on Trade Policy and Law. She was also a member of the World Economic Forum’s Trade and Investment Council for 2018-2020.

Prior to founding ATC/ATCF and the ABTA, she was head of the Temasek Foundation Centre for Trade & Negotiations (TFCTN) and Senior fellow of International Political Economy at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.

Dr. Elms received a PhD in political science from the University of Washington, a MA in International Relations from the University of Southern California, and bachelor’s degrees from Boston University.

She is the author of numerous articles, editor of several books, and regularly published the Talking Trade Blog at www.asiantradecentre.org/talkingtrade. Dr. Elms also routinely appears on television and in major newspapers and magazines around the world to comment on trade and economic issues. Dr. Elms also makes frequent appearances at a range of global trade and economic workshops, conferences, capacity building sessions and negotiations.

Paul Baker is the founder and chairman of International Economics Consulting Ltd, a global management consultancy firm that operates in over 50 countries, with offices in the UK, Mauritius, and Vietnam. He is also the founder and chairman of the Africa Trade Foundation, which is dedicated to building a thriving trade and investment ecosystem across the Continent.

He has over 25 years of experience as an economic adviser to governments from G7, G20, and G90 countries. He has held lead economist positions with various clients, such as the European Commission, World Bank, World Economic Forum, World Trade Organisation, Asian Development Bank, and several UN agencies. For his significant contribution and extensive experience in his professional field, Paul has been named a Global Leader in Trade & Customs by Who’s Who Legal for the last eight consecutive years and Thought leader on trade and customs matters. He is a member of the expert group on Data flows for the World Economic Forum - the WEF/WTO Trade Tech Working Group on AI, IOT, Blockchain, and Digital Identities for trade.

He is a visiting professor at the College of Europe and has been a faculty member and visiting professor at international universities in Europe, Asia, and Latin America. He is the author of several handbooks on trade. Paul completed an MSc (Econ) in Economics from the University of London (SOAS), a Maîtrise in Financial Engineering from the University of Nantes (France) and completed Executive Programmes in Systems Dynamics, Artificial Intelligence and Big Data Analytics at MIT, and Computational Computing in Python at the University of California Berkeley.

Pierre Sauvé is a Senior Trade Specialist in the Geneva office of the World Bank’s Macroeconomics, Trade and Investment Global Practice, where he leads the Bank’s work on trade governance with key stakeholder organizations in Geneva and Paris. Previously, he served as a faculty member and as Director of Studies and Director of External Programs and Academic Partnerships at the University of Bern's World Trade Institute (WTI), in Switzerland. He holds visiting professor appointments at the World Trade Institute and at the University of Barcelona, whose LL.M. program in international economic law and policy (IELPO) he advises. He held Visiting Professor appointments at the College of Europe in Bruges, Belgium in 2006-17 and at the Institut d’Etudes Politiques (Sciences-Po) in Paris, France and the London School of Economics and Political Science in 2003-05. He served as a senior economist in the OECD Trade Directorate from 1993-2002, a period during which he also taught at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and was appointed Non-resident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C. (1998-2000). Prior to joining the OECD, he served as services negotiator within the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade's Office of North American Free Trade Negotiations (1991-93). He was previously a staff member of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade in Geneva, Switzerland (1988-91) as well as the Bank for International Settlements, in Basel, Switzerland (1987-88). Mr. Sauvé was educated in economics and international relations at the Université du Québec à Montreal and Carleton University in Canada and at Cambridge and Oxford universities in the United Kingdom. He has advised the governments of a number of OECD and developing countries and served as a consultant to leading regional and multilateral agencies involved in trade, finance and development.

Mr. Mikheil Janelidze is a Sector Lead in Trade Policy at PMCG. He has a proven history of success in the field of international affairs and economic development with an exceptional mix of public and private sector experience on international fora.

While working as Vice Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of Georgia between 2015 and 2018, Mr. Janelidze helped to deepen the country’s ties with the United States, the European Union (EU), Western and Central Asian states, as well as Japan, India and China, resulting in strengthened economic and security cooperation, enhancing Georgia’s economic integration with the largest regional and world economic powers. During this time, Georgia became the leader of the EU’s Eastern Partnership program and strengthened its trade and security ties with the United States and NATO, concluded a free trade agreement with China, launched negotiations on a bilateral investment treaty with Japan, and started free trade exploratory talks with India. Meanwhile, during this period, Georgia also took a leadership role in the process of implementing Sustainable Development Goal #16, established by the United Nations (UN), and chaired the Open Government Partnership (OGP).

In 2011-2015, Mr. Janelidze served as Vice Minister of Economy and chief trade negotiator of Georgia. Here, he successfully negotiated the Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement (DCFTA) with the EU that resulted in the upgrading of Georgia’s trade policies. He also actively participated in the development and implementation of enterprise and SME development mechanisms. During this period, Georgia strengthened its relations with international donors and international financial institutions (IFIs), and augmented investments in sustainable development, clean energy, and transport infrastructure.

Prior to taking on these high-profile public roles, Mr. Janelidze worked in the private sector as a manager and an entrepreneur in business development and management consulting, primarily focused on international trade and investment.

Mr. Janelidze has a strong academic background, as he holds an MBA in Global Management from the Grenoble Graduate School of Business, and a bachelor’s degree in International Relations from Tbilisi State University. He has also completed an executive program entitled “Artificial Intelligence: Implications for Business Strategy” from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Sloan School of Management. Meanwhile, Mr. Janelidze is fluent in Georgian, English, and Russian, and intermediate in German.

Henry Gao is Professor of Law at Singapore Management University and Senior Fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI). His research areas include WTO, International Trade Law, Chinese Law and Law and Economics. He worked at the WTO Secretariat supporting negotiations among members in Geneva, as well as at the Faculty of Law of the University of Hong Kong (HKU), where he served as the Deputy Director of the East Asian International Economic Law and Policy (EAIEL) Program. As the Academic Coordinator of the first Asia-Pacific Regional Trade Policy Course officially sponsored by the WTO, he played an instrumental role in setting up the WTO’s flagship training program for the region when it was launched 20 years ago. He is a member of Advisory Board of WTO Chairs Programme and an Advisor to the Asia-Pacific Research and Training Network on Trade (ARTNeT), an initiative by the UNESCAP. He sits on the editorial boards of the Journal of International Economic Law and Journal of Financial Regulation, both published by Oxford University Press.