20/22/24 July 2026 — 9:00 am Eastern US / 15:00 CET / 18:30 IST
Please join GW Law School’s Government Procurement Law Program for a free three-part webinar series on emerging strategies for public procurement in international development. Experts from around the world will discuss a changing landscape for international development and new opportunities for those in the global procurement community.
Sessions
Each session starts at 9:00 am ET/15:00 CET/18:30 IST and runs for one hour.
Monday, July 20 – Introduction – Key Developments
Co-moderator: Professor Benedetta Audia (GW Law / LUISS)
Jun Jin, General Counsel and Director of the Office of Legal Services, UNDP (invited) has been asked to discuss key changes in how international development organizations are addressing public procurement.
Caroline Nicholas, a former senior member of the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (invited), will discuss UNCITRAL’s reopening of the UNCITRAL Model Law on Public Procurement — a key tool for international development globally.
Wednesday, July 22 – Contracting in International Development
Co-moderator: Jean-Jacques Verdeaux (Procurement Practice Manager for the Latin America and Caribbean Region, World Bank), will discuss the World Bank’s ongoing initiative to improve public contract administration.
Vinay Sharma, co-author with co-panelist Prabhat Garg of Demystifying International Public Procurement (forthcoming), will address the unique contracting issues presented by contract award and administration.
Friday, July 24 – Anti-Corruption and Socially Responsive Procurement
Co-Moderator: Professor Sope Williams (GW Law / Stellenbosch University)
Prabhat Garg, drawing on his book with co-panelist Vinay Sharma, Demystifying International Public Procurement (forthcoming), will address international institutions’ focused approach to anti-corruption.
Professors Williams and Yukins, as co-moderators, will discuss emerging trends globally in anti-corruption and socially responsive procurement.
Panelists and Moderators
Benedetta Audia is the Principal of International Development LLC, a firm advising private sector companies in international development and business matters and providing counsel to multilateral organizations, non-governmental organizations and government entities on a wide array of issues including United Nations privileges and immunities, due diligence, investigations, funds receipt and disbursement, project design and dispute settlement. Prior to establishing International Development LLC, Ms. Audia was a Partner at DLA Piper, where she founded and chaired the firm’s global international development practice. Before joining DLA Piper, Ms. Audia spent almost two decades working at the United Nations as Corporate Legal Advisor, where she conceptualized the legal architecture of thousands of multimillion-dollar projects implemented in developing countries, where she traveled extensively to lead negotiations with high-level government officials. Prior to joining multilateral organizations, Ms. Audia worked on mergers and acquisitions at Gianni Origoni and was involved in numerous domestic and international transactions.
Prabhat Garg is an international program management and public procurement expert with about 40 years of experience with Multilateral Development Banks and Bilateral Development Partner agencies, working across the globe in several countries, including in the former Soviet Union region. Mr. Garg worked with the World Bank (1984-2000), Washington DC, where he designed and managed international programs, projects, and procurements in various positions. In 2006, Mr. Garg joined the US federal government working on international public procurement, where he worked in Senior Executive Services (SES) grade levels, leading an international public procurement practice group that developed policies and managed procurements funded by an US government’s foreign aid agency, the Millennium Challenge Corporation or MCC. He retired from the US government in 2024. Mr. Garg holds an engineering degree from the Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee, India, and M.B.A. from the University of Maryland, USA. He holds PMP and USFAR professional certifications.
Jun Jin serves as the General Counsel and Director of the Office of Legal Services at the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). He is a seasoned legal executive with over 25 years of experience in international development, humanitarian, and administrative law, who previously led a global team of legal professionals at USAID to provide strategic legal counsel to Agency officials on high-profile programs. He has a proven track record in advising senior officials on complex, sensitive, and highly visible matters impacting upon programming around the world. He is recognized as a leader and coalition builder in the development and humanitarian assistance legal community across multilateral and bilateral development agencies, for-profit and private sector companies, non-profit organizations, foundations, philanthropies, and the U.S. Government interagency legal community.
Caroline Nicholas served as a Senior Legal Officer with the International Trade Law Division of the United Nations Office of Legal Affairs (the UNCITRAL Secretariat). She also served as Secretary to its Working Group on Procurement and Infrastructure Development, which drafted the UNCITRAL Model Law on Public Procurement (issued in 2011), an accompanying Guide to Enactment (2012), and other UNCITRAL documents in the field. As Secretary to this and other UNCITRAL Working Groups, she provided legal and policy advice and works in partnership with other international bodies engaged in public procurement policy activities. She advises on public procurement reform and its role in supporting international trade and development and the rule of law, and provides regular technical assistance to national governments in all regions. She also serves as a Chairman of a UN Performance Appraisal Rebuttal Panel, and undertakes voluntary policy advice and conflict resolution roles within the UN Secretariat. She previously advised on international war damage claims at the UN Compensation Commission, was a UN internal investigator, and has practised law in the City of London and Hong Kong. Caroline is a Solicitor of the Supreme Court of England and Wales and of the Supreme Court of Hong Kong, an Associate of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators, and the Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Vienna International School. She is a member of the Editorial Board of the Public Procurement Law Review and regular contributor to it and other journals. She is married with three children, and speaks four languages fluently.
Vinay Sharma is recognized as a distinguished authority on international public procurement, governance, and institutional reform, with over 35 years of global experience spanning Multilateral Development Banks, public infrastructure enterprises, and high-level advisory roles—linking fiduciary integrity with development effectiveness, market creation, and institutional trust. Mr. Sharma began his career in India’s public sector infrastructure enterprises, working on large rail and urban transport projects, He subsequently transitioned to international development finance, serving in senior leadership roles at the African Development Bank (2008–2017) and the World Bank (2017–2022). In these capacities, he led major policy reforms, contributed to the modernization of procurement frameworks, strengthened fiduciary oversight systems, and supported operations across Africa, Asia, Europe, and fragile and transition contexts. He retired from the World Bank in 2022. Mr. Sharma continues to serve as an advisor to Multilateral Development Banks, Bilateral institutions, and governments on procurement reform, delivery models, professionalization, supplier diversification, and integrity systems. He has also acted as Probity Advisor on complex, high-value infrastructure projects, reinforcing transparency, defensibility, and governance credibility. He serves on the Board of Engineers Against Poverty and contributes to academic and professional discourse on procurement modernization and governance innovation. Mr. Sharma holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Civil/Structural Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee, India, where he was awarded Gold Medals.
Jean-Jacques Verdeaux is currently the Procurement Practice Manager for the Latin America and Caribbean Region (LCR) of the World Bank. Mr. Verdeaux is a US-French educated Lawyer, who first joined the Bank in 2002 as Senior Procurement Specialist in the Africa region and held, since then, various positions including Senior Counsel in the Legal procurement group, Procurement Coordinator for the Andean Countries, Lead Procurement Specialist for the Middle East and Northern Africa. Before his current assignment, he worked at the European Investment Bank in Luxembourg, where he was the Senior Procurement Adviser for the Energy Department. In his current position as Manager for Latin America and the Caribbean, Mr. Verdeaux leads a team of more than 35 World Bank procurement specialists who supervise operations in 32 countries. The portfolio includes operations in critical infrastructure, education, environment, health, including the procurement of vaccines during the pandemic for more than US$ 15 billion. The unit is also engaged in a dialogue with Borrowers on how to increase the efficiency of their respective procurement systems in a time of high inflation and need for climate action. Jean-Jacques graduated from the George Washington University Law School (LL.M in Federal Government Contracts -2002) and the University of Lorraine (Faculté de droit de Nancy – 1988) and is admitted to the Paris Bar. He is a regular lecturer and author in the field of public procurement policy of International Financing Institutions and procurement reform. Mr. Verdeaux is fluent in both Spanish and English and lived for years in the United States and Latin America. He is currently based in Panama.
Sope Williams will be joining the faculty of George Washington University Law School in August 2026. She is a professor of public procurement law, a procurement law consultant and the deputy director of the African Procurement Law Unit, Stellenbosch University, South Africa. She is an expert in public procurement law and policy in Africa, procurement in the multilateral development banks, gender-responsive procurement, emergency contracting, sustainable public procurement, and anti-corruption law. Professor Williams has written significant policy reports on gender-responsive procurement, and has provided training funded by the Brookings Institution (USA) on gender-responsive procurement and to develop behavioral tools to mitigate public procurement corruption in Nigeria. She has developed anti-corruption courses for UNODC (2019) and the UN Virtual School (2012) and served as an academic member in the World Bank’s Procurement Technical Advisory Group. She is an editor of four international journals and a Vice-Chair of the anti-corruption committee of the International Bar Association. She co-developed and teaches on the LLM and PGDip in Public Procurement Regulation and Policy at Stellenbosch University. She has an LLM (with distinction) from the London School of Economics (2000), and a PhD in public procurement and anti-corruption law from the University of Nottingham, UK (2011). Her research has been cited by the South African Constitutional Court.
Series Moderator: Christopher Yukins, Lynn David Research Professor in Government Procurement Law, George Washington University Law School