Our team

Chris Southworth is Secretary General at ICC United Kingdom and a regular voice for business in the international media. He is also co-founder of the UK Centre for Digital Trade and Innovation and acts as the ICC representative to The Commonwealth as well as Co-Chair of the B2B Cluster for the Commonwealth Connectivity Agenda. He is a member of the ICC World Council as well as the International Advisory Boards of the Digital Trade Network and Queen Mary-UNIDROIT Institute of Transnational Commercial Law.

Chris is a leading international expert on creating modern digital trade ecosystems, the founder of the ICC Digital Trade Roadmap, a member of the global team supporting the ICC Digital Standards Initiative, ICC G7 United Kingdom representative, a member of the ICC G7, G20, Digitisation and Ecommerce Working Groups. He is also a lead independent adviser to the UK government on the digitisation of trade on behalf of industry working with the Department for Business and Trade, Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, Her Majesty’s Treasury and Department for Science, Innovation and Technology.

Prior to joining ICC, Chris was Executive Director for Global Partnerships, at the British Chambers of Commerce, Head of the International Chambers of Commerce Unit at UK Trade and Investment (UKTI) and a Senior Policy Advisor to Lord Heseltine, former Deputy Prime Minister, for his independent review of UK competitiveness. In 2011 he was advisor to the Minister for Trade and Investment for the government review of mid-size businesses and consequent establishment of the mid-size business export programme. Former roles have encompassed deregulatory and social enterprise policy at the Department for Business.