Ms. Bárcena Ibarra is a Mexican biologist who was, until recently, the Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC). She has acted as Coordinator of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), in charge of a global programme on environmental citizenship with emphasis on the participation of civil society. She served as Acting Chef de Cabinet in the Executive Office of the Secretary-General under H.E. Kofi Annan in 2006. On 3 January 2007, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon appointed Bárcena as UN Under-Secretary-General for Management. Ms. Bárcena previously served as Co-ordinator of the Latin American and Caribbean Sustainable Development Programme of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), responsible for the Environmental Citizenship Project at the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). She was the Founding Director of the Earth Council in Costa Rica, a non-governmental organization in charge of follow-up to the agreements reached at the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED).
