Prior to his appointment, Mr. Moreira da Silva was Visiting Full Professor at the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto, Adjunct Professor at the Paris School of International Affairs (Sciences Po) and Chairman of the Lisbon-based think-tank Platform for Sustainable Growth.

He was most recently Director of the Development Co-operation Directorate of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in Paris (2016-2022), where he successfully launched and led a restructuring of the Directorate with the objective of boosting horizontality, collaboration and co-creation. As Head of the Secretariat of the Development Assistance Committee (DAC), he led the design and negotiation of new DAC standards and regulation on: ending sexual exploitation, abuse, and harassment in development co-operation; enhancing coordination of the humanitarian-development-peace nexus; enabling civil society; blended finance principles and guidance; framework for SDG aligned finance; impact standards for financing sustainable development; decision to align development co-operation with the goals of the Paris Agreement (that ended new ODA for unabated international thermal coal power generation in 2021). He also led the development of a new development finance measurement tool – ‘Total Official Support for Sustainable Development (TOSSD)’.

Before joining OECD, Mr. Moreira da Silva was the Minister for Environment, Energy and Spatial Planning of Portugal from 2013 to 2015 where he launched a comprehensive set of reforms such as: the green taxation reform (including the creation of a carbon tax), the restructuring of the urban waste sector, the development of renewable energy and electrical mobility, the reform of the water services sector, the reform of housing and spatial planning, and the nature conservation program that reintroduced the Iberian lynx. He was also very active in the negotiations on the Paris Agreement and on the EU Energy and Climate 2030 framework.

Prior to his ministerial position, he served as Senior Environmental Finance Adviser and Programme Manager on Climate Change Innovative Finance at the United Nations Development Programme (2009-2012); Senior Adviser to the President of Portugal on Science and Environment (2006-2009); Secretary of State for Environment and Spatial Planning (2004-2005); Secretary of State for Science and Higher Education (2003-2004); and Member of the Portuguese Parliament and Member of the European Parliament (1999-2003), where he authored the legislation that created the European Union GreenHouse Gas Emissions Trading Scheme (the world's first major compliance carbon market).

Mr. Moreira da Silva graduated from the University of Porto, Portugal, with a degree in electrical and computer engineering and holds a postgraduate degree in senior management from the AESE-IESE Business School, Navarra University, Spain.

He is fluent in English, French, Portuguese and Spanish.