Leila Baghdadi is a Senior Economist at the MENAAP Chief Economist Office, World Bank. Prior to that, Leila was a Professor of Economics at ESSECT, University of Tunis, where she held the World Trade Organization Chair. She was an executive board member of the Central Bank of Tunisia from August 2019 to June 2023. She was appointed as a member of the Tunisian Council of Economic Analysis reporting to the Chief of Government from November 2017 to February 2021. Her research interests focus on international and development economics. Leila received her PhD from University Paris 1, Pantheon Sorbonne in 2008. In 2006, she was a WTO PhD fellow. She joined University of Rome Tor Vergata as a Marie Curie Researcher in September 2007.
Only around one in five women of working age participate in the labour markets of the Middle East, North Africa, Afghanistan and Pakistan. As this column explains, the region can no longer afford to leave half its human capital underused. Expanding women’s labour force participation is central to growth and resilience in the face of looming demographic change.