Shari Arison

Shari Arison is an American-Israeli businesswoman and philanthropist. She was born in the United States (1957) and is the daughter of Mina Arison Sapir and American-Israeli businessman Ted Arison, the founder of Carnival Cruise Lines.

Shari Arison has a major beneficial interest in Carnival Corporation, the world’s largest cruise company, and has served twice on its board of directors.

She leads the Arison Group, a business and philanthropic group. The Group’s business arm is made up of leading corporations including Bank Hapoalim, Israel’s largest bank; Shikun & Binui, one of the largest real estate and infrastructures companies in Israel and Salt Industries, the largest salt manufacture in Israel She is also the founder of Miya, the Arison Group’s global water company.

The Group’s philanthropic arm includes the Ted Arison Family Foundation, which addresses the needs of the community; Essence of Life, an organization whose aim is to heighten awareness and provide tools for attaining inner peace, both in Israel and abroad; All One, an organization established to generate a global conversation of a new reality and whose message can be summed up as “We are all connected. We are all part of one”; and Ruach Tova (Good Spirit), an organization in Israel which encourages volunteerism and provides comprehensive assistance to people interested in volunteering. In this framework, Shari Arison initiated the annual Good Deeds Day, which each year gives people the opportunity to volunteer and help others.

From the early 1990s until September 2009, Shari Arison served as the chairman of the Arison Group, Arison Investments, the Ted Arison Family Foundation, and she established and chaired Essence of Life, as well as All One.

She is also the founder and former chairman of Matan – Your Way to Give, an affiliate of United Way International.

In 2009, Shari Arison’s book, Birth – When the Spiritual and the Material Come Together, was published (in Hebrew) in Israel, where it immediately became a bestseller. The book was translated into English and published in the United States; it is expected to be published soon in Indonesia, as well as in additional countries.

Arison is repeatedly ranked by Forbes Magazine as one of the world’s wealthiest women, and was also ranked by Forbes among the 50 most influential women in the world in 2008. In April 2010, she was ranked No. 2 on the Forbes list of the World’s Greenest Billionaires in recognition of her wide-ranging contributions to the environment both in Israel and throughout the world, which she puts into practice in all of her business dealings.

In both 2007 and 2009, Shari Arison was chosen as Woman of the Year by Globes, one of Israel’s leading financial newspapers.

In 2005, she was named as an Honorary Fellow of the Decade at the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, where she has been serving as a board member since 2007.

Shari Arison is the mother of four and resides in Israel.