Barbara Stocking joined Oxfam GB as Chief Executive in May 2001. Oxfam GB is a major international non-government organisation whose mission is “to work with others to overcome poverty and suffering”.

Oxfam brings together humanitarian and long term development work as well as campaigning on the causes of poverty. Barbara has led major humanitarian responses most recently both the Horn of Africa and now West Africa food crises, as well as the Haiti earthquake, Pakistan floods and Tsunami. On campaigning Barbara led Oxfam’s work on Make Poverty History, and more recently on climate change and the current Grow campaign on food justice in a resource constrained world. Barbara regularly speaks at major global meetings for example at the UN, in New York and Rome and at Davos.

Previously a member of the top management team of the National Health Service, in her eight years with the NHS, Barbara worked as regional director for the South East of England, and then as the founding Director of the NHS Modernisation Agency. Barbara has a Masters degree in physiology, and has broad experience of healthcare systems, policy and practice, including periods at the National Academy of Sciences in the USA and with the World Health Organisation in West Africa.

Barbara is married and has two sons. She was awarded a CBE for health services in 2000 and a Dame Commander of the British Empire (DBE) for humanitarian services in the 2008.

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