Yi Xiaozhun

Yi Xiaozhun began his first term as Deputy Director-General of the WTO on 1 October 2013. He has been reappointed for a second four-year term, starting on 1 October 2017.

Yi Xiaozhun has extensive experience in world trade and economics, both as a senior government official and subsequently as China's ambassador to the WTO.

He represented China as a key negotiator in China’s WTO accession process, making an important contribution to the negotiations.

Prior to becoming China's ambassador to the WTO in 2011, Mr Yi was Assistant Minister and subsequently China's Vice Minister of Commerce in charge of multilateral and regional trade negotiations and cooperation. Besides his contribution to China’s WTO accession, he played a leading role in negotiating numerous free trade agreements (FTAs), including the China-ASEAN agreement, China's first FTA, and advanced China's involvement with Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation (APEC), the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM), the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the 10+3 East Asia Summit (EAS) and related high-level meetings. He also worked as a diplomat at the Chinese Embassy in the United States for more than four years from the late 1980s to the early 1990s.

After becoming China’s ambassador to the WTO, Mr Yi was elected as the Chair of the Working Party of the Accession of Lao PDR and showed effective leadership in the process leading to WTO membership for Laos.

Mr Yi obtained a Master's degree in economics from Nankai University in China in 1999.

He is married to Meng Xiaoling and has one daughter.