Sunday Times 2
UNESCO’s front-runner with a dynamic vision
View(s):- Mexican nominee Gabriela Ramos in Sri Lanka, second country on campaign trail
By Kumudini Hettiarachchi
She is on a quest – to place UNESCO in its rightful place at the “top of the mind” of all people across the globe. “I want you to think UNESCO as the most useful institution.”
Passionate about and committed to what UNESCO is doing in arenas integral to humanity, Gabriela Ramos, is the dynamic Mexican nominee for the top seat at this specialized UN agency. Now she is ‘Candidate Director General (DG)’, whereas earlier she was Assistant DG for Social and Human Sciences.
UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, is “dedicated to strengthening our shared humanity through the promotion of education, science, culture and communication”.
UNESCO’s Candidate DG Gabriela Ramos and Mexican Ambassador to Sri Lanka, Federico Salas based in New Delhi, in Colombo
In Sri Lanka, the popular knowledge about UNESCO revolves around the World Heritage Sites but this agency sets standards, creates tools and advances knowledge to tackle global challenges, promoting equality and peace. Protecting biodiversity, addressing Artificial Intelligence (AI), improving education, safeguarding heritage and ensuring reliable information are very much a part of its mandate.
Launched back in November 1945, it has 194 member states including Sri Lanka and is governed by the General Conference and the Executive Board. The Secretariat, headed by the DG, implements the decisions of these two bodies.
It is for this post of DG that Ms. Ramos is vying, the ‘fairer face’ with two male contenders from Egypt and Congo. If she is voted as the DG in October, she will be the third woman among 10 – joining the first, Irina Bokova from Bulgaria (2009-2017) and the second Audrey Azoulay (2017 to now). She would be the only one from the Global South. “We still have way to go for gender equality at the top at UNESCO – 3/10,” concedes Gabriela.
UNESCO’s Candidate DG Gabriela Ramos in Colombo. Official portrait of Gabriela Ramos
The Sunday Times meets her during a whistle-stop trip to Sri Lanka this week arranged by the Honorary Consul for Mexico, Mohan Pandithage who is Chairman & Chief Executive of Hayleys PLC. On a hectic campaign trail, Ms. Ramos’s very first countries were Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and India.
Having been nominated for UNESCO’s top post by the first woman President of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, the Ambassador of Mexico to Sri Lanka, Federico Salas based in New Delhi, describes Ms. Ramos as a “transformative force” who would bring about strong leadership as well as creativity to UNESCO.
Ms. Ramos had sought the support of Sri Lanka for her bid for DG and also had “very good” discussions with Prime Minister Dr. Harini Amarasuriya and Foreign Minister Vijitha Herath on key issues including education, digitization and science.
She reiterates the need for policies based on scientific evidence in a world filled with dogmas and grave misinformation. While she is a champion for gender equality, she has spearheaded the only ‘Global Standard in AI’.
On how she will propel UNESCO to the top above all other institutions, Ms. Ramos says: “I actually achieved this with the work I am doing on AI. For that, we need to connect with decision makers and leaders, understand their priorities and tailor our support. Many institutions of the UN system stay at the high level. Creating alliances for education or signing agreements on the environment. We need to get down on the ground and understand what the needs of countries are.
“Take a look at the Global Standard that I achieved on the ethics of AI with the 194 member states adhering to it. But I also created a diagnostic tool (Readiness Assessment Methodology) to know where individual countries are and also where they want to go. What are their priorities? I am deploying this tool in 70 countries including Sri Lanka and then discussing the policies, legal frameworks, skills, connectivity, investments that are necessary. We should be doing this on science, STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics), culture, media, etc. We have some interesting elements like the institutes for planning and managing of education, but they need a quantum leap.
“And as we can establish standards (Conventions, Recommendations, Declarations), they provide us with the benchmark to work from them and help countries achieve it! My experience also draws from the transformation I oversaw of the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development), as they also did good analysis but never linked it to current policy debates.
“By ‘going national’ we could provide members with evidence for policy reforms in education, health, environment, taxes. When you engage with members at this level, and being a knowledge organization, you can always be there when they need you! This is my top of mind.”
Born in Michoacan, Mexico, and fluent in three languages, Spanish her mother tongue and English and French, Ms. Ramos is very much science and evidence based.
In a career spanning over 35 years, Ms. Ramos has held powerful posts including OECD’s Chief Negotiator at Group of Seven (G7) and Group of 20 (G20) and earlier the Mexican Foreign Affairs Ministry.
We get glimpses of her childhood in Mexico when she says that her parents sent her to a public school instead of a private one so that she would get to know her country. She was bright, she acknowledges with humility, and once she completed her work in class, her primary teacher would ask her to help a few of her peers.
“It was sad,” she recalls, for how could a child concentrate on numbers or writing when he/she had come to school without breakfast. That early initiation to the face of poverty may have triggered her battle for social justice, she believes, along with the awareness that the world should be more sensitive to the needs of the voiceless.
Her championing of women’s rights had been inculcated by her parents who believed that girls including herself should be educated and not married off at an early age, like some of her friends who were restrained from going to university and had to make do with a lesser qualification. There is much laughter when we realize that all four journalists interviewing her are women and Ms. Ramos looks back at her household when she joined UNESCO and moved to Paris, France.
“It consisted of myself, my two daughters Paula and Julia, the nanny and her daughter and our female dog, with the sole male being my husband Ricardo López,” she smiles, on a lighter note.
| If the US withdraws funding…… “The United States of America (USA) came back to UNESCO because we were deemed to be useful, particularly with the work that we are doing on Artificial Intelligence. I do not believe this has changed in substance. However, the new US administration will set their priorities and then assess how useful we are. This is what the administration is doing, evaluating and will come with an outcome soon. I am hopeful they will remain the same.” This was the response of contender for UNESCO’s top post, Gabriela Ramos, when asked by the Sunday Times whether there are fears of funding withdrawal under the new US administration of President Donald Trump. The US has withdrawn funding twice before – in 2011 when UNESCO granted membership to Palestine and in 2017 citing anti-Israeli bias and management issues. Then in 2023, President Joe Biden pledged 22% of UNESCO’s budget and payment of arrears ($619 million). Asked how UNESCO would meet the gap if the US decides to withdraw funding, Ms. Ramos adds that the agency has shown its relevance by attracting voluntary contributions that allow it to advance its work. “We would need to look into this to keep delivering.”
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