David Beasley

David Beasley, former Governor of South Carolina, served as the Executive Director of the World Food Programme (WFP), having been nominated by two Presidential Administrations of two different parties and appointed to that role initially in 2017 by the UN Secretary-General, and served until April 2023. Under Mr Beasley’s leadership, WFP became the world’s largest humanitarian organisation, assisting over 160 million people in 2022 alone and raising more than $55 billion to combat global hunger. In 2020, Mr Beasley accepted the Nobel Peace Prize on behalf of WFP for its efforts to provide food assistance in conflict areas and to prevent food from being used as a weapon of war. He serves on The Rockefeller Foundation’s Board of Trustees, where he continues his work at the intersection of leadership, crisis response, and global food security.