Ad Melkert was appointed by Secretary-General Kofi Annan to the position of UN Under-Secretary-General and Associate Administrator of UNDP effective 1 March 2006.

Previously, Mr. Melkert served as a member of the Board of Directors at the World Bank for over three years where, as Executive Director, Mr. Melkert represented Armenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Georgia, Israel, FYR Macedonia, Moldova, The Netherlands, Romania, and Ukraine. The Board of Directors of the World Bank, chaired by the President, oversees the bank's business, including approval of loans and guarantees, new policies, the administrative budget, country assistance strategies, and borrowing and financial decisions.

Mr. Melkert joined the World Bank after a long and prominent political career in the Dutch Labour Party. He was member of Parliament and Minister of Social Affairs and Employment, becoming the party's parliamentary leader in 1998. In 2001 he was elected party leader, succeeding then prime minister Wim Kok.

Mr. Melkert has had a longstanding involvement in issues of international and development cooperation. He was active in the international and European youth movement and worked for the Dutch development NGO Novib. In Parliament, he was a member of the Standing Committees for Foreign Affairs and Development Co-operation. As a Minister, he led the Dutch delegations to the UN World Conference on Women in Beijing (1995) and to the International Labour Organization’s annual meetings.

Mr. Melkert holds a Master's degree in Political Sciences from the University of Amsterdam. He is married to Chilean painter Mónica León Borquez and has two daughters. In addition to his native Dutch, he speaks English, German, French, and Spanish.