Dambisa Moyo

Early life and education

Dambisa Moyo was born in 1969 in Lusaka, the capital of Zambia and studied chemistry at the University of Zambia. She finished her degree in the U.S. via a scholarship to American University in Washington, D.C. Moyo received a BS in Chemistry from American University in 1991, and an MBA in Finance from the university in 1993.

She acquired a Master of Public Administration (MPA) degree at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government in 1997. In 2002 she received a DPhil in Economics from St Antony's College, Oxford University. Her Oxford studies were in macroeconomics, and her doctoral dissertation was on savings rates in developing countries.

World Bank and Goldman Sachs

Following her MBA from American University, Moyo worked at the World Bank from May 1993 to September 1995. She was a consultant in the Europe and Central Asia department and the Africa department, and co-authored the World Bank's annual World Development Report.

After pursuing her MPA and PhD degrees at Harvard and Oxford, Moyo joined Goldman Sachs as a research economist and strategist in 2001. She was at the company until November 2008, working mainly in debt capital markets, hedge funds coverage, and global macroeconomics. Part of her tenure at Goldman Sachs was spent advising developing countries on the issuing of bonds on the international market. She was also Head of Economic Research and Strategy for Sub–Saharan Africa.

Board memberships

After leaving Goldman Sachs, Moyo joined the board of directors of the international brewer SABMiller in 2009. She was chairman of the company's Corporate Accountability and Risk Assurance Committee (CARAC), which oversees the entire company's responsibilities in relation to corporate accountability, including sustainable development, corporate social responsibility, corporate social investment, and ethical commercial behavior. In 2010 Moyo joined the board of directors of Barclays Bank. She sits on three of the board's committees: the Audit Committee; the Conduct, Operational and Reputational Risk Committee; and the Financial Risk Committee. In 2011 she joined the board of directors of the international mining company Barrick Gold. She sits on the board's Audit Committee; Corporate Governance and Nomination Committee; and Corporate Responsibility Committee. In 2015 Moyo joined the board of directors of data storage company Seagate Technology.

On August 9, 2016, Chevron Corporation (NYSE: CVX) announced that Moyo had been elected to Chevron's board of directors. According to the press release, Moyo’s appointment would be effective October 11, 2016.

Moyo is a former board member of the charity Lundin for Africa, and a former patron of Absolute Return for Kids (ARK). She is also a former board member of Room to Read.

Writing and public speaking

Moyo's first book, Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There Is a Better Way for Africa, was published in early 2009 and was a New York Times bestseller. Dead Aid catapulted Moyo into the public eye and made her a sought-after speaker, pundit, and author. In 2009 she was named a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader, one of TIME's 100, and one of Oprah Winfrey's "20 remarkable visionaries".

The book consolidated her career of traveling worldwide investigating and analyzing economic conditions and writing about her conclusions. By 2015 she had travelled to more than 75 countries, examining the political, economic, and financial workings of emerging economies. She became a regular columnist and contributor to many financial networks and multinational business publications, as well as a speaker at conferences and other venues worldwide. She has written and lectured on topics ranging from global markets, the impact of geopolitics on the economy, the future of the job market, the outlook for growth in China, and the past and future paths of interest rates.

Moyo's second book, How the West Was Lost: Fifty Years of Economic Folly – And the Stark Choices that Lie Ahead, was published in January 2011 and was also a New York Times bestseller. Her third book, Winner Take All: China's Race for Resources and What It Means for the World, was published in June 2012 and was also a New York Times bestseller.

Moyo is a member of the World Economic Forum's (WEF) Global Agenda Council on Global Economic Imbalances, and spoke at the 2005 annual WEF conference in Davos. In 2009 she spoke at the Council on Foreign Relations the American Enterprise Institute, and was one of the two debaters on the winning side of the 2009 Munk Debate, where the subject was foreign aid. She was a participant at the annual Bilderberg Conference in 2010, while in 2011 she spoke at the Peterson Institute for International Economics and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). In 2013 she was a participant at the U.S. Federal Reserve's Jackson Hole Economic Symposium, spoke at the Aspen Institute and the Ambrosetti Forum. She is also a member of the Bretton Woods Committee.

Awards and honors

Dead Aid

Moyo's first book, Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There is Another Way for Africa (2009) argues that government-to-government foreign aid has harmed Africa and should be phased out. It became a New York Times bestseller, and has been published in Chinese, English, French, German, Greek, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Portuguese, Spanish and Dutch.

The Financial Times summarized the book's argument, stating "Limitless development assistance to African governments, [Moyo] argues, has fostered dependency, encouraged corruption and ultimately perpetuated poor governance and poverty." The book suggests that official development assistance (ODA), as opposed to humanitarian aid, perpetuates the cycle of poverty and hinders economic growth in Africa. The book offers developing countries proposals for financing development instead of relying on foreign government-to-government aid. Harvard professor and historian Niall Ferguson wrote the foreword to Dead Aid. Rwandan president Paul Kagame wrote that "Dead Aid has given us an accurate evaluation of the aid culture today."

In a review of the book, economist Paul Collier stated, "Aid is not a very potent instrument for enhancing either security or accountability. Our obsession with it has detracted from the more important ways in which we can promote development: peacekeeping, security guarantees, trade privileges, and governance." The pro-aid organization ONE Campaign disagreed with the book, stating that it calls to "cut-off all aid". Moyo has pointed out in a number of interviews that this is a misrepresentation of her ideas and that she is not criticizing humanitarian aid, and the Financial Times noted that ONE's campaign "at least partially backfired". The economist Jeffrey Sachs said more foreign aid is needed to improve conditions for Africa, but Moyo pointed out that when Sachs was her lecturer at Harvard it was he himself who taught that "the path to long-term development would only be achieved through private sector involvement and free market solutions".

In a 2013 interview Bill Gates was asked for his views on Dead Aid's illustration that aid to African governments has not alleviated poverty but has instead kept the African economy crippled rather than supporting sustainable African business. He claimed to have read the book and stated "books like that – they're promoting evil". Responding on her website, Moyo stated "To cast aside the arguments I raised in Dead Aid at a time when we have witnessed the transformative economic success of countries like China, Brazil and India, belittles my experiences, and those of hundreds of millions of Africans".

How the West Was Lost

Moyo's second book, How the West Was Lost: Fifty Years of Economic Folly – And the Stark Choices that Lie Ahead (2010), gives an account of the decline of the economic supremacy of the West over the past 50 years, and posits that the world's most advanced economies are squandering their economic lead. In her opinion, Moyo examines how America’s flawed decisions and blinkered policy choices around capital, labor, and technology have resulted in an economic and geopolitical seesaw that is poised to tip in favor of the emerging world.

The book became a New York Times bestseller, debuting at No. 6. It also debuted at No. 4 in the Washington Post, and No. 2 in the Wall Street Journal's and Nielsen BookScan's business bestsellers.

In a review, Paul Collier stated that "her diagnosis of the recent disasters in financial markets is succinct and sophisticated", and "I applaud her brave alarum against our economic and social complacency: her core concerns are sufficiently close to painful truths to warrant our attention." Dominic Lawson wrote in The Sunday Times, "This argument … can rarely have been made more concisely.... Moyo is a very serious lady indeed." The Guardian stated, "How the West Was Lost is more interesting, wider in scale and more important than Dead Aid."

In contrast, Alan Beattie of the Financial Times wrote, "The challenges it identifies are for the most part real, if not original. But the huge flaws of the emerging economies are ignored." The Economist said "these arguments need much better supporting material than the book provides".

Winner Take All

Moyo's third book, Winner Take All: China's Race for Resources and What It Means for the World (2012), examines the commodity dynamics that the world will face over the next several decades, according to Moyo. In particular, it explores the implications of China's rush for natural resources across all regions of the world. Noting that the scale of China’s resource campaign for hard commodities (metals and minerals) and soft commodities (timber and food) is one of the largest in history, Moyo presents her research and conclusions concerning the financial and geopolitical implications of a world of diminishing resources. Winner Take All continues where How the West Was Lost left off, and Moyo argues that China is already well on the way to gaining the upper hand in world economic dominance.

Winner Take All became a New York Times bestseller, debuting at No. 13, as well as entering the Wall Street Journal's and Nielsen BookScan's business bestsellers at No. 4 and the Publishers Weekly nonfiction bestseller list at No. 11.

A review in the Financial Times stated that "If Dambisa Moyo is right, the demands of the world's most populous state are bad news for the rest of us.... One cannot accuse Moyo of failing to do her homework." The Independent concluded, "This is not an elegantly written book.... But she does go to the heart of the issue: what China does over resources is profoundly important, and that deserves our attention."

The Telegraph commented "Moyo thinks [China’s impact on the global commodity market] will go on and on, powered by an unstoppable Chinese economy. Perhaps she is right, but the grounds for doubting whether the future will be a straight line from the past deserve a hearing." The Guardian wrote, "for all Moyo's insistence that a crisis is inevitable and that China will be the only gainer, we are in uncertain territory here."

Additional publications and lectures

Moyo is a frequent public speaker and columnist. She has written for international financial and economic journals and other periodicals and publications, and has lectured worldwide at some of the world's financial and economic summits, forums and conferences, as well as at numerous venues including TEDTalks and BBC's HARDtalk. She is also a commentator on networks such as CNBC, CNN, Bloomberg, BBC, and Fox Business. She was one of the seven judges of the 2015 Financial Times and McKinsey Best Business Book Award. Some of her recent articles are:

Personal life

Moyo resides in New York City. She is an avid runner, and has run several marathons and half marathons. She travels extensively for board meetings, for lecturing and personal appearances.