Augusto
Lopez-Claros has been the Chief Economist and Director of the Global
Competitiveness Program at the World Economic Forum in Geneva. In this
capacity he traveled widely and engaged with senior policymakers in
government and the business community on the policy and institutional
requirements associated with improvements in the business environment.
For many years he was the editor of the Forum's Global Competitiveness Report,
including the 2006-2007 edition. He is the founder of EFD – Global
Consulting Network an international consultancy specializing in
economic, financial and development issues.
He has a
degree in
mathematical statistics from Cambridge University, England, and a
Ph.D. in economics from Duke University in the United States.
Before joining the Forum in 2003 he was Executive Director and
Senior International Economist with Lehman Brothers International
in London. During his 5-year stay with Lehman he wrote extensively
on a broad range of economic and financial topics, such as
sovereign debt restructuring, foreign direct investment in
transition economies, capital account liberalization, growth, and
the role of good governance in the development process. As part of
this research work and to meet with Lehman clients he traveled
extensively in Europe, North and South America, the Middle East and
Asia. He is a frequent commentator on economic and financial
issues, having given well over 150 TV interviews during the last
seven years on all the major networks. Before Lehman he worked as
an economist with the International Monetary Fund in Washington, an
organization he joined in the mid-1980s.
During his
years of
service at the Fund his assignments included being country
economist for Spain; working in the Fund’s main policy making
department, where he begun to work on Eastern Europe and did some
of the early work at the Fund on good governance. From 1992 to 1995
he was Resident Representative for the IMF in the Russian
Federation, where he was responsible for program implementation
issues in the context of the IMF’s multibillion dollar program of
assistance to the Russian Federation. His stay in Russia was
followed by a one-year sabbatical in Moscow, an opportunity he used
to do research (subsequently published by the IMF) and to travel
extensively throughout Russia to gain a broader perspective on the
transition. Prior to his service with the IMF, he was Professor of
Economics at the University of Chile, Santiago, where, in addition
to his teaching duties, he also headed a research team financed by
the Ministry of Health examining economic aspects of alcohol abuse
in Chile.
Dr.
Lopez-Claros has
written and lectured extensively on a wide range of topics in his
field, including European economic integration, the determinants of
competitiveness, reform issues in transition economies, the
European Monetary System, and on a broad range of financial and
macroeconomic issues affecting emerging markets. He is a much
sought-after speaker, having spoken in the last several years in
such places as: the American Chamber of Commerce in Moscow; the
Writers’ Union in Sofia, Bulgaria; the Oxford Business School;
Darwin and Corpus Christi Colleges at Cambridge University; the
RAND Business School in California; the European Central Bank in
Frankfurt, the Central Bank of Chile; Imperial College in London;
the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London; the
Friends’ Meeting House in Canterbury; the Shakespeare Library in
Moscow, the India Economic Summit in New Delhi, the China Business
Summit in Beijing, Marlborough House in London, the New York Stock
Exchange, the Aspen Institute in Washington DC, the Australian
Leadership Retreat, the International Leadership Forum in Kuala
Lumpur, Microsoft's 2007 Government Leaders Forums in Edinburgh
and Cartagena, the European Business School in Frankfurt, the 2008
United Nations Commission on the Status of Women in New York, among
many others. He has an abiding interest in the growth and
development of global interdependence and cooperation and the
importance of international institutions in their principal role of
promoting and safeguarding human prosperity.
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