Louise Blais

Senior Specialist Advisor, U.S. and International Affairs at Business Council of Canada

Speaker

Former Ambassador Louise Blais was Canada’s Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York from 2017-2021. During this time, she had responsibility for the UN Sustainable Development Goals and also served as Vice President on UNICEF’s Management Board.

She is now Associate at the Atlanta-based Pendleton Group and Senior Advisor to the Business Council of Canada. She is the author of numerous commissioned reports and articles, a public speaker and frequent media commentator on international affairs and economic development.

Having begun her career at Interpol, Louise Blais joined the Department of Foreign Affairs in 1996. As a senior diplomat, she served abroad in Washington,Tokyo and as Minister-Counsellor for Political Affairs at the Embassy in Paris. She was Consul General in Atlanta, representing Canada in six U.S. states, before being named Ambassador to the UN in 2017.

In 2023, she was appointed by the Minister of International Trade to the Board of Invest in Canada. She is on the Advisory Boards of ADC Technologies and Canadian American Business Council. She is Strategic Advisor to the QG100, a network of top Quebec companies with international operations.

She regularly leads or participates in business delegations to international meetings, such as the Trilateral Free Trade Commission (Canada, USA and Mexico), the Canada-Mexico High Level Economic Dialogue.