Elizabeth Littlefield
Chief Executive Officer
Consultative Group to Assist the Poorest
Washington, D.C.

Elizabeth Littlefield is one of the Bank's senior spokespeople on microfinance. She is the Chief Executive Officer of the Consultative Group to Assist the Poorest (CGAP), a multi-donor organization created to help build a large scale permanent microfinance industry providing flexible, high-quality financial services on a sustainable basis to the poor. CGAP provides technical assistance and strategic advice, development and dissemination of technical tools and services, delivery of training, and in-depth research products.

Prior to joining CGAP in 1999, Ms. Littlefield was the Managing Director in charge of J.P. Morgan's financing business in Central, Eastern and Southern Europe, Central Asia, Middle East and Africa. Her responsibilities encompassed public and private financings for governments, corporations and banks, and related advisory work such as debt management and credit rating advisory. She also held positions at J.P. Morgan as a Vice President and Head Debt Trader in Africa, Eastern Europe and Asia, and as a Director in J.P. Morgan's Paris office, among others.

Ms. Littlefield also spent 1989–90 providing banking consultancy to several microfinance institutions in West and Central Africa. She has served on the Board of Trustees of Women's World Banking from 1992–94 and on the Executive Committee of the Board as treasurer from 1994–99.