Isabel Wetzel

Ms. Isabel Wetzel is currently an Innovation Officer at UN-Habitat, leading the establishment of the first United Nations Innovation Technology Accelerator for Cities in Hamburg, Germany. She has over eight years of professional and research experience on issues of sustainable urban development. She has a keen interest in bridging public policy and innovative scientific and technological solutions to achieve better urban governance, planning and management.

Her expertise lies in urban resilience and ecological protection, urban environmental planning and biodiversity management, blue economy and cities, provision of basic services and resource-efficient infrastructure, and local capacity building. In her ability to influence strategic development decisions, she has negotiated a variety of development projects with diverse stakeholders, donors and partners. Countries she has worked in include Kenya, Rwanda, Seychelles, São Tomé and Príncipe, China, Myanmar, and Iran.

Prior to joining the UN, she worked in quality assurance and portfolio management at the World Bank, based in Washington, DC, USA. Ms. Wetzel holds an MSc in Urbanization and Development from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and a BA in Liberal Arts and Social Sciences from the University College Maastricht.

She is based in Nairobi, Kenya.