Meral Guzel leads ands coordinates United Nations’ Women’s Entrepreneurship’s Accelerator, a multi-partner initiative designed to advance women entrepreneurship ecosystem around the world in collaboration with six United Nations agencies. She joined UN Women in 2015 as Empower Women Regional Coordinator for Europe and Central Asia and later established WEPs Secretariat within UN Women.

Previously, she founded and launched the Women’s Banking department of BNP Paribas TEB and also designed and managed several multi-country programmes at the World Bank. Meral has over 18 years of senior-level experience within international development, advancing gender agenda in collaboration with the private sector, financial institutions, and institutional partners. Meral’s expertise includes women’s entrepreneurship, gender and blended finance and women’s empowerment at the workplace.