He is a strategic planner with extended international experience in the Arab and Asia regions in providing policy advice; planning; programming; and managing large portfolios in the fields of “knowledge societies/economies”, education, cultural development, poverty alleviation, and socioeconomic development. Also, he is an expert, with hand-on experience, in change management and in piloting UN reform with special emphasis on evaluation of impact, effectiveness and efficiency.
He has authored, coordinated/directed and substantially contributed to several land mark publications and papers as well as regional and international level developmental reports (Director/Coordinator: “Arab Knowledge Report: 2014 -Youth and Localization of Knowledge”; “Arab Knowledge Report 2010/2011-Preparing Future Generation for the Knowledge Society”; “Arab Knowledge Repot 2009-Towards Productive Intercommunication for Knowledge”; “Water Governance in the Arab Region- Manging Scarcity and Securing the Futur”. Coordinator of the“Arab Human Development Report 2005- Towards the Rise of Women in the Arab World”; and the “Arab Human Development Report 2004-Towards Freedom in the Arab World”; substantially participated in writing AHDRs of 2002 and 2003; and several other socioeconomic/cultural initiatives). He is the author of the first Arab Millennium Development Report 2003 and he supervised, and tangibly contributed to the formulation of several other developmental reports all over the Arab region. He also has publications in socioeconomic/population-environment dynamics. In addition, he is an expert in gaming and simulation.
Ghaith Fariz has a Ph. D. in Planning from the University of Michigan, USA, with main course of research involving socioeconomic development, socioeconomic environment dynamics, and gaming & simulation for research and training. He is Jordanian and he is married with four children.