Secretary-General Appoints Jorge Moreira da Silva of Portugal Executive Director United Nations Office for Project Services

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres announced today the appointment of Jorge Moreira da Silva of Portugal as Executive Director of the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS).

The Secretary-General wishes to extend his appreciation and gratitude to Jens Wandel of Denmark, for his service as Acting Executive Director.

Mr. Moreira da Silva is currently a Visiting Full Professor at the Faculty of Engineering of Oporto University and Adjunct Professor at the Paris School of International Affairs (Sciences Po).

He was most recently Director of the Development Co-operation Directorate of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in Paris (2016-2022), where he successfully launched and led a restructuring of the Directorate with the objective of boosting horizontality, collaboration and co-creation.  As Head of the Secretariat of the Development Assistance Committee, he anchored the formulation of new standards on development cooperation and humanitarian aid.

Before joining OECD, Mr. Moreira da Silva was the Minister for Environment, Energy and Spatial Planning of Portugal from 2013 to 2015 and Visiting Full Professor at the Lisbon University.  Prior to his ministerial position, he served as Senior Environmental Finance Adviser and Programme Manager on Climate Change Innovative Finance at the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) (2009-2012); Senior Adviser to the President of Portugal on Science and Environment (2006-2009); Secretary of State for Environment and Spatial Planning (2004-2005); Secretary of State for Science and Higher Education (2003-2004); and Member of the Portuguese Parliament and Member of the European Parliament (1999-2003), where he authored the legislation that created the European Union Green House Gas Emissions Trading Scheme.

Mr. Moreira da Silva graduated from the University of Porto, Portugal, with a degree in electrical and computer engineering and holds a postgraduate degree in senior management from the AESE-IESE Business School, Navarra University, Spain.

He is fluent in English, French, Portuguese and Spanish.