Dr. Mohamed El-Ashry was trained as a geologist. Following a scientific career, during the 1990s he served as the Chief Environmental Adviser to the President and to the Director of the Environment Department at the World Bank, as Senior Vice President of the World Resources Institute (WRI), as Senior Environmental Adviser to UNDP, as Special Adviser to the Secretary General of the 1992 U.N. Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), and as a member of the World Water Commission. He joined the Global Environment Facility (GEF) in its pilot phase in 1991 as Chairman, and led the GEF as CEO and Chairman from 1994 to 2003.