World Press Freedom Day 2017

Farhana Haque Rahman is the elected Director General of Inter Press Service IPS, an international news agency bringing news and views from the South to influence policies for equitable development. She served as a senior United Nations official for over three decades, providing strategic leadership in communications, as Senior Advisor, FAO, and Media and External Relations Chief, IFAD. She has moderated and facilitated high level panels at the Asian Development Bank and the FAO; and conducted international capacity building workshops for journalists.
Earlier, she spent several years as a journalist and news anchor in Africa, Asia, Europe and the Middle East. She received the first National Award for outstanding performance as television and radio anchor and broadcaster in Bangladesh. She served as advisor on media relations, communications and parliamentary affairs to a number of heads of state and government and leaders of international organizations.
She attended a high-level program on Strategic Leadership Management at the Said Business School of Oxford University. She has authored a number of publications including the IFAD study “Status of Rural Women in China”, and lectures on media and communications at IULM University in Milan, John Cabot University in Rome, Italy and East West University, Dhaka, Bangladesh.