Zainab Usman

Zainab Usman is founding director of the Africa Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Her expertise is identifying policies and institutions that enable low- and middle-income economies to harness natural resources for sustainable economic development. Previously, Usman was a public sector specialist at the World Bank, working on energy policy reforms, natural resources management and disruptive technologies. She has done research work at University of Oxford Blavatnik School of Government and for the Nigerian government. Usman authored the book “Economic Diversification in Nigeria: The Politics of Building a Post-Oil Economy,” one of Financial Times’ 2022 best books on economics, and was lead author of the paper, “How Can African Countries Participate in U.S. Clean Energy Supply Chains?”