Wafaa El Khoury is the Service Chief for Near East and North Africa and Europe and Central Asia Service within the Investment Centre of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). She has over 30 years of experience in agricultural development, especially in the areas of crops and farming systems. Prior she worked for with various international development agencies including FAO, IFAD, GEF-UNDP, and USAID, with the International Centre for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA) and as an associate professor at both the Lebanese University and the American University of Beirut, and adviser to the Minister for Agriculture in Lebanon. She is an agricultural engineer by profession and holds a PhD in Plant Disease Epidemiology from Germany.