The World Bank said Wednesday it hopes to find a successor by early May to chief David Malpass, who has announced he will step down nearly a year early. The Washington-based development lender will begin accepting candidate nominations on Thursday, a process that will run until March 29. The bank says women candidates would be "strongly" encouraged, reported AFP. A shortlist of three candidates will then be issued, followed by "formal interviews... with the expectation of selecting the new president by early May 2023." By informal agreement, not cited in the statement, the president of the World Bank is typically an American, while the head of the International Monetary Fund is customarily a European. The 66-year-old Malpass, was appointed in 2019 when Donald Trump was president after previously serving as Under Secretary of the Treasury for international affairs. A week ago, he made a surprise announcement that he would leave his post nearly a year before his term was due to expire in 2024. His tenure at the World Bank saw the organization grapple with global crises such as the Covid-19 pandemic, the Russian invasion of Ukraine and an international economic slowdown. In recent months, Malpass has faced calls for his resignation or removal, with environmental activists accusing him of climate change denialism. Last September at a forum, Malpass declined to say if he believed fossil fuels were driving climate change, drawing sharp condemnation from the White House. Malpass later told CNN that he was not a climate change denier and that human-generated emissions were "clearly" contributing to warming.