Dr. Zainab Usman is a Senior Research Scholar at the Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs. She is Managing Director for International Programs at the Energy Opportunity Lab, where she leads the Center’s work on energy for development in emerging markets.
Usman’s research focuses on how energy systems can support structural transformation and industrialization in low- and middle-income economies. Her work spans industrial policy and global supply chains, financing the energy transition and managing just transitions, as well as technological innovation. At the Center, her research builds on deep experience in Africa and extends to South and East Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, and the Middle East.
Previously, Usman was the founding director of the Africa Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, D.C. From 2021 to 2025, she built the program into a globally recognized platform for policy-relevant research and high-level convening, raising millions of dollars in philanthropic support, leading a multidisciplinary team, and producing research that shaped international debates on energy, trade, and economic development. She was previously a public sector specialist at the World Bank, where she worked on energy policy reforms, social sustainability, natural resource governance, and digital technologies. She has advised governments and development partners in Côte d’Ivoire, Morocco, Nigeria, Papua New Guinea, the Republic of Congo, Serbia, Tanzania, and Uzbekistan.
Usman has briefed senior officials at the White House, the U.S. Departments of Energy, State, Commerce, and Treasury, the U.S. Trade Representative, and subnational governments in the United States. She has testified before the U.S. Congress and briefed the United Kingdom’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and institutions of the European Union.
Her enduring area of expertise is the political economy of natural resources, particularly the policies and institutions that enable resource-rich emerging markets to harness hydrocarbons, minerals, and metals for sustainable economic development. She is the author of Economic Diversification in Nigeria: The Politics of Building a Post-Oil Economy, selected by the Financial Times as one of the Best Economics Books of 2022. She is also co-editor of the World Bank volume The Future of Work in Africa: Harnessing the Potential of Digital Technologies for All, and a contributor to major World Bank flagship reports, including Rethinking Power Sector Reforms in Developing Countries.
Usman’s research has been published in African Affairs, the World Bank’s Policy Research Working Paper Series, and edited volumes by Oxford University Press. Her work has appeared in The Economist, Financial Times, The New York Times, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, Project Syndicate, Bloomberg, BBC, Forbes, Der Spiegel, Al Jazeera English, and The Washington Post.
Usman is the founding principal and chief executive officer of Elem Analytics and Advisory Group, a boutique data analytics firm. She serves on the boards of BRAC Global in Bangladesh, the Natural Resources Governance Institute in New York, and the Aig-Imoukhuede Foundation in Nigeria.
She holds a DPhil (PhD) from the University of Oxford, an MSc from the University of Birmingham, and a BSc from Ahmadu Bello University.
