Bernard Petit

Bernard Petit is the Deputy Director General of the Directorate General for Development of the European Commission.

He holds a Ph.D. in European economy from the University of Paris and a degree from the School of Business Management. Mr. Petit joined the European Commission in 1971 and has worked in development issues ever since. Before becoming Deputy Director General, he was Director of Development policies, prior to which he had led several Divisions, including Financing, Programming, Macroeconomic Support and Forward Planning.

Beyond his responsibility for the global and sectoral policies, Mr. Petit chairs the Interservice Quality Support Group, responsible for coherence and quality of the European Commission’s country strategy papers for all the regions of the world. He headed the task-force negotiating the Cotonou Agreement (1998-2000) and was the Chief Negotiator for the revision of this Agreement (2004-2005).