John D. Tuminaro
Department of State
2021 fellow
Mr. Tuminaro serves as Senior Food Security Advisor for the Department of State’s Bureau of International Organizations Affairs. In his 31-year diplomatic career, Mr. Tuminaro broke new ground in the way the Department addresses humanitarian, development, and environmental fields with his ability to bring new ways of thinking to a traditional organization and through the application of his well-honed analytical, negotiation, organizational, and management skills.
In his current role as Senior Food Security Advisor, he supervises a team that helps manage the United States’ more than $3.45 billion a year partnership with the United Nations (UN) Rome-based food security agencies, including the Nobel Peace Prize-winning World Food Program, the Food and Agriculture Organization, and the International Fund for Agricultural Development, and addresses food security and agricultural development throughout the UN, the UN General Assembly, and international organizations system.
Mr. Tuminaro has led teams to address such high-profile humanitarian catastrophes like the Balkan War in the 1990s, the 2011 famine in the Horn of Africa, and the civil wars in Syria and Yemen. He won a Superior Honor Award in 2003 for his bilateral work with Russia on nuclear non-proliferation, including his role in successfully concluding negotiations on the $7.5 billion Highly-enriched Uranium Low-enriched Uranium Agreement, among others. In the 1990s, Mr. Tuminaro pioneered at the Department the application of intelligence to the subjects of environment and sustainable development.
Mr. Tuminaro has a B.A. in International Affairs and an M.A. in Geography, both from The George Washington University. He was also a National Geographic Society Fellow and a teaching assistant.
As a WHLDP Fellow, Mr. Tuminaro will work on the Modernizing Federal Infrastructure Permitting CAP Goal through his assignment to the Federal Permitting Improvement Steering Committee.
