Cristina Narbona Ruiz

Ms. Narbona Ruiz holds a doctorate in Economics from the University of Rome, which she received in 1973. From 1985 to 1991, Ms. Narbona Ruiz was the Director-General of the Mortgage Bank of Spain. In 1991, she was appointed Director-General of housing and architecture at the Ministry of Public Works, Transport and Environment. Then, in 1993, she was named Secretary of State for Environment and Housing at the Ministry.

From 1993 to 1999, Ms. Narbona Ruiz was elected Deputy of Almeria at the Chamber of Deputies. She also held the position of deputy spokesperson for the Socialist Group at the Environment Commission. From 1999 to 2003 she was adviser to the Mayor of Madrid and deputy spokesperson for the Municipal Group of the Spanish Socialist Worker's Party and socialist responsible for the environment. In 2000, she was named member of the Federal Executive Commission of the Spanish Socialist Worker's Party and Secretary of the Environment and Territorial Development. In March 2004, she was elected to Congress as Deputy for Madrid. Ms. Narbona Ruiz served as Spain’s Minister of Environment from April 2004 until her nomination as the Permanent Representative of Spain to the OECD on 6 May 2008. She is a professor of international economics at the University of Sevilla.