ISTANBUL – An Indian-origin woman who was chosen by the World Trade Organization to help the World Food Program prepare and market wheat for a bid to win the 2019 World Bank Global Wheat and Food Price Index has been named India’s first ever Bidder in the international trade agency’s Global Wheat Price Index.
The announcement by the WTO was made on Thursday in a news release announcing that the woman, who had been selected by the board of the World Health Organization’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), had become the first Indian woman to be elected to the World Council of Trade and Development (WCTD) in the Global Wheat Index.
“The World Trade Council (WCID) has a mission to help people and communities around the world to access food.
For years, this mission has been strengthened by a team of experts and volunteers who provide expertise and training in food and nutrition to governments, NGOs, businesses and citizens in a variety of fields,” said World Trade Secretary-General Fatih Birol.
“The WTCTD is proud to support the efforts of the Women in the Food Industry (WIFI) to make the World Wheat Price index more accessible and more inclusive.”
A graduate of the Tata Institute of Social Sciences in Pune, India, with a PhD in international development from the Jawaharlal Nehru University, the Bidder will join the WIFI at the beginning of 2019.
She is the recipient of a gold medal for her contribution to the project during the WICAN 2014 World Wheat Summit in Delhi.
“I was honoured to be selected by World Trade in the 2017-18 wheat and wheat futures markets, and the World Economic Forum’s World Wheat Board (WTB) as one of the top 50 nominees for the 2019 Wheat Price Rankings,” said Bidder, who is also a board member of the India Wheat Board.
The WTB was established in 2004 by the International Wheat Board as a platform to provide information and guidance to governments and business leaders.
Bidder is the only Indian woman chosen by World Bank officials to serve on the board.
The Women in Food Industry is a voluntary organization dedicated to the promotion of sustainable food production and consumption in India, and its mission is to foster an environment where women can make meaningful contributions to food policy making and implementation by facilitating a better understanding of food consumption, availability and quality.
The World Wheat Index is a comprehensive global measure of wheat production and food prices for each country.
In the 2018-19 season, it has tracked wheat prices at three levels: the official price level, the price at which producers export their wheat and the price of wheat exported by the private sector.
In the Wheat Price Ranking, Bidder was selected for the top 40 wheat producers from the top 30 wheat producers in each of the three wheat price categories.
In total, she has made a contribution to both Wheat Price Statistics and Wheat Price Rankings.
She has also been nominated as one to serve as a member of WTB’s Executive Board.
Bid, who has been the recipient and board member for more than two decades, has also held various roles in the Indian Wheat Board since 2010.
She has worked on the Global Strategy for Food Security, the WTI Board’s Wheat Index, Wheat Risk, Wheat and Grain Risk Management and Wheat Board Nutrition, among others.
The nomination of Bidder by World Council for Trade and Investment was announced at the opening of the annual WTFI summit in Delhi in December.