Miriam Lutz

Miriam Lutz, Mission Director – Joined USAID/Mali in September 2021.

Ms. Miriam Lutz has been with the USG for over two decades, working at both policy and field levels.  Previously the USAID Representative in Sierra Leone, she has also served in USUN New York, USUN Rome, Washington, Iraq, Pakistan, Malawi, Tanzania, Burundi, D.R.Congo and Lebanon.  Ms. Lutz served 6 years as USAID’s Health Office Director in Malawi and Tanzania, managing large teams and budgets, and overseeing major health initiatives such as PEPFAR (HIV/AIDS), the President's Malaria Initiative (PMI), and the Global Health Security Agenda (GHSA).  She has received Superior Honor Awards from the U.S. Department of State and USAID, and a Joint Staff Outstanding Civilian Service Medal from the Department of Defense. In previous posts, she has served as Housing Board chair, Civil-Military Coordinator (CM2), Mission Disaster Response Officer (MDRO), and represented USAID on the interagency ICASS Council.  Prior to USAID, Ms. Lutz spent a decade in humanitarian response with the UN and NGOs in the Rwanda and Bosnia contexts, and served as Deputy Director in the US resettlement program in Somali, Sudanese and Ethiopian refugee camps in Kenya. In 1996, she was recruited to establish the global humanitarian response for the World Council of Churches, headquartered in Geneva, managing 200 international and local non-governmental organizations on 4 continents. Early in her career she worked as a French Interpreter for the Department of State’s International Visitor Program. Ms. Lutz hails from the Midwest and East Africa, having spent her adolescence in Tanzania and Madagascar. She holds a Master of Arts from the Monterey Institute for International Studies and a Master of Public Health from the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health.  She speaks French, Spanish, conversational Swahili, and has studied Mandarin, German, Chichewa and Italian.