Mexico intends to nominate senior trade official Jesus Seade, who helped revise the North American Free Trade Agreement, as a candidate for the post of next director-general of the World Trade Organization (WTO), Reuters reported referring to sources.

The post of WTO Director-General will become vacant in late August after incumbent Roberto Azevedo, from Brazil, said he would step down a year early. 

The next CEO will face tensions between the US and China and increased protectionism, exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Seade is currently Mexico’s deputy foreign minister for North America and has experience working in China as well as with the United States.

He was the deputy general director of the WTO when it was established in the early 1990s. He has also worked at universities in Hong Kong for over 10 years.

WTO members can nominate their citizens as candidates from June 8 to July 8. Several names were mentioned as possible candidates from Africa and Europe, and some in Europe believe that the leadership of the trade body should alternate between the developing and developed worlds.