Eleni Zaude Gabre-Madhin

Who is Eleni Zaude Gabre-Madhin?

Eleni Zaude Gabre-Madhin is an Ethiopian economist and a former Chief Executive Officer of the Ethiopia Commodity Exchange. She has had many years of experience working on agricultural markets - particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa – and has held senior positions in the World Bank, the International Food Policy Research Institute, and United Nations. She has a PhD in Applied Economics from Stanford University, and Bachelors and Masters degrees in Economics from Cornell University and Michigan State University respectively. Dr. Eleni was selected as "Ethiopian Person of the Year" for the 2002 ET calendar year by the Ethiopian newspaper Jimma Times.

She was the main driving force behind the development of the Ethiopia Commodity Exchange. Whilst working as a researcher for the International Food Policy Research Institute she examined agricultural markets for many years and noticed, as had many others, that whilst in some years or regions there were severe shortages or droughts in others there were surpluses or bumper harvests. Specifically in her survey of grain traders in 2002, she found that a key factor was the lack of effective infrastructure and services needed for grain markets to function properly. Traders often failed to have access to sufficient credit, information about the market, transportation and other vital resources and contract compliance was difficult to enforce.