Sheila Watson

Deputy Director, FIA Foundation

Sheila Watson is Deputy Director of the FIA Foundation, a UK-based Charity which is committed to promoting safe sustainable mobility across the world.

Sheila leads the Foundation’s work on environmental and sustainability issues, clean air and gender, as well as its research programme. She is also Executive Secretary to the Global Fuel Economy Initiative (GFEI), which seeks to support the development of fuel economy policies across the world, and The Real Urban Emissions Initiative (TRUE) which uses real world emissions data to support the uptake of clean vehicles. Sheila is a board member of several mobility initiatives and projects such as the World Bank’s sustainable mobility for all (SUM4ALL) project. She was recently named as one of the 40 most influential women in transport by the German Government.

An economist, with many years’ experience as an advisor and consultant, her previous role was as Senior Special Adviser to the UK Labour government at the Department for Trade and Industry, The Privy Council, the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, and the Foreign Office. During the 10 years she spent at the heart of the UK government, she specialised in a range of environmental and resource protection issues from sustainable farming and food production to international climate security. Her former roles include Deputy Director of the Centre for Local Economic Strategies, and Policy Researcher at the Institute for Fiscal Studies. Sheila has an Honours Degree from the University of Oxford, and an MSc in Economics from Birkbeck College, London.