Quotes from Arancha Gonzalez

It is no coincidence that in the wake of the Arab Spring, investment in youth-related initiatives, especially related to employment, has increased sharply.

You must stand up for multilateralism. You must make trade great again.

I have seen African countries negotiate bilaterally and within the WTO. African countries come to the WTO prepared and defend their interests with vigour.

Governments can't credibly claim to be concerned about stagnant growth and ageing workforces unless they are actively seeking to empower women economically. One way they can speed up progress towards gender-equal economic opportunity is to change laws that are holding women back.

There is no intrinsic reason African countries should be importing, rather than exporting, basic staples like rice or higher value products like frozen chicken, cooking oil, or instant noodles.

Technology is making it easier for women to connect to business opportunities around the world. Legal obstacles must not be allowed to stand in their way. That's not just because it's economically smart. It's because discrimination shouldn't be the law.

Governments around the world are looking for economic growth and job creation. African economies are no exception, with increasing recognition that growth has to be built on a more diversified economic structure in order to make a lasting contribution to development.

Economic policy that adheres to the tenets of orthodoxy while failing to deliver for large sections of society is doomed to fail.

Sometimes all it takes to connect entrepreneurs to overseas buyers is to get them into the same room.

The social and legal discrimination that relegates hundreds of women to subordinate or marginal economic roles has a huge aggregate cost.

You only have a problem when you admit you have a problem.

Africans don't just need more jobs: they need better jobs.

The representatives of young professionals and woman entrepreneurs deserve seats at the big table to evolve viable, efficient, and sustainable solutions for problems the world is faced with. Without their participation, there will always be a deficit of compassion and innovation.

In landlocked developing countries, geographical barriers to markets are unnecessarily accompanied by virtual ones: their e-connectivity rates are among the world's lowest.

I have been talking to trade ministers in various countries who all say that gender inclusivity is important to them. We need to make this importance visible to the rest of the world and catalyse action towards more inclusive trade.

Can trade help lift people out of poverty? It can, and it has.