Julien Gourdon is a senior economist and project manager in the AFD’s Africa department. He is a specialist in international trade and economic development issues and responsible for the technical assistance programme for the African Union. Its main research topics are trade policy, export competitiveness, regional integration and the mining sector.

He was an economist at the OECD from 2014 to 2020, before that he was an economist at the CEPII from 2011 to 2014 and at the World Bank from 2006 to 2011. He holds a PhD in economics from CERDI-University of Auvergne and is a Senior Fellow at Ferdi.