Emma Brigham

Emma Brigham is the current UNICEF Representative in Sri Lanka, a role she assumed on 4 August 2025.

As the Representative, Ms Brigham’s responsibilities include, providing leadership and vision to the UNICEF Country Office, managing, and leveraging partnerships and resources for the achievement of results and realization of the rights of children.

Before being appointed the Representative to Sri Lanka, Ms. Brigham served as the Deputy Representative for UNICEF in Bangladesh, an office of over 350 UNICEF staff from 2022-2025. During this period, Bangladesh experienced a governance crisis and political unrest that led to change of government. Ms. Brigham steered UNICEF’s programmes to protect children and respond to their urgent needs, in addition to UNICEF’s ongoing support to the Rohingya refugees at the time.

From 2019 to 2022, Ms. Brigham was the Deputy Representative in Sri Lanka where she led UNICEF’s programmes, including the response to COVID-19 and the 2022 economic crisis.

Before that she served with UNICEF Mozambique from 2013 to 2019, including as Chief of Planning.

Prior to joining UNICEF, Ms. Brigham worked for the Aga Khan Foundation, first in Washington DC, then in Mozambique supporting donor engagement and community-led projects.

She also worked at a UK-based thinktank, Chatham House, where she was responsible for supporting Track II diplomacy in the Middle East.

Ms. Brigham is a UK national. She holds a Masters degree in development studies and a Bachelor of Arts in International Relations.