Hilda AL-HINAI

Hilda Al-Hinai, Secretary General of the Arab-Swiss Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CASCI) in Geneva – Switzerland since November 2022. She is from Oman and was born in Zanzibar.  Before joining CASCI, she worked as Deputy Permanent Representative of Oman to the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the Director of the Sultanate of Oman office to the WTO. She was in charge of WTO, World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), United Nations Conference on Trade and Development ( UNCTAD) and International Trade Centre (ITC). Hilda established Oman’s office to the WTO and participated in Oman’s accession negotiations to the WTO. She attended Seattle, Doha, Cancun, Hong Kong, Geneva, Bali, Nairobi and Buenos Aires WTO Ministerial Conferences. She was the chairperson for the Working Party on Accession of Seychelles to the WTO from 2009 until 2014, when Seychelles accession was officially approved by the WTO members . She was one of the Founding Members of the Recently Acceded Members Group in the WTO (RAMs), currently known as Article XII members .

Since 2018, she became a member of the World Trade Organization Experts to provide technical support and advice to the acceding countries. She is also a member of the WTO Trade for Peace Initiative.  

From 1990 to 1998 she worked at the Ministry of Commerce and Industry in Oman as Management Researcher, Director of the office of Undersecretary of Industry, Director of Industrial Inspection Department and Director of Industrial Development Department. As part of her work in the Ministry she was in charge of training program for young Omani private sector managers in collaboration with Japanese experts in the Ministry. She was also in charge of organizing regional and international seminars and conferences in the industry sector. Part of her job included inspection of factories, conducting studies for sick industries, allocation of quota to factories under the WTO Textile and Clothing Agreement, and also headed Omani business delegations to visit industries in UK and US.

Miss Al-Hinai graduated from the University of Jordan in the field of Political Science and Economics).

Since 2001 she participated as speaker in various activities organized by WTO, UNCTAD, ESCWA and IDB. She is a lecturer, since 2017 at the Oman National Defense College for a master’s program for senior government officials. In addition, she was invited by the WTO to share her experience in negotiating accession to WTO with many acceding countries (Iraq, Syria, Somalia, Azerbaijan, Tajikistan, Iran, Algeria,Lebanon etc). In 2005 she wrote a paper for ESCWA on WTO Implementation Issues.

Ms. Al-Hinai chaired many regional and interest groups meetings in WTO like the Arab Group, the GCC Group and the RAMs (Recently Acceded Members).

As part of her activities, she organized, in coordination with the WTO, events in celebration of the International Women’s Day as well as Omani Women’s Day. Moreover, She coordinated participation of various Omani entities in the WTO’s Public Forum and ‏the WTO Open Day. ‏

In‏ 2013, she started the Omani Young Professionals Training Initiative . She offered training at Oman’s Office to the WTO for Omani young professionals from various government agencies, private sector and university students.

In 2006, with the approval of the late Sultan Qaboos bin Said, she was decorated for being one of the “Distinguished Arab Women” by His Majesty the King of Bahrain during the first Arab Women Summit under the Arab League in Manama, Bahrain.

In 2022, She was decorated for her achievements in Public Services and Human Resources Development,  by the Gulf Cooperation Council ( GCC ).