The IDB has named Guillermo A. Calvo chief economist and manager of its Research Department. As the IDB’s most senior economic advisor, Calvo will help shape the Bank's policy positions while directing a team of researchers that produces original analysis on a broad range of issues.
A citizen of Argentina, Calvo received a Ph.D. in economics from Yale University in 1974. He subsequently held tenured faculty positions at Columbia University, the University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Maryland, where he was also the director of the Center for International Economics. He holds the Carlos Díaz-Alejandro Chair of International Finance at the University of CEMA in Buenos Aires and has worked as research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research.
From 1988 to 1994, Calvo served as senior advisor to the Research Department of the International Monetary Fund, and in recent years has also advised several governments in Latin America and Eastern Europe.
A recipient of the Simon Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship and the King Juan Carlos Prize in Economics, Calvo has published several books and more than 100 articles in leading economic journals. He is president of the Latin American and Caribbean Economic Association and a fellow of the Econometric Society.
Calvo's main field of expertise is the macroeconomics of emerging market and transition economies. He is temporarily serving as a principal advisor to the IDB. He will assume his new appointment officially on June 1, 2001.
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Bank names manager for sustainable development
Carlos M. Jarque, a citizen of Mexico, has been named manager of the IDB’s Sustainable Development Department, where he will oversee a wide variety of programs in areas such as government, civil society, the environment, social development and financial markets, among others.
Jarque, who was most recently social development minister under former Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo, holds a Ph.D. in economics from the National University of Australia. He also received a master's degree from the London School of Economics and Political Science and conducted graduate studies at the University of Oslo and Harvard University.
Prior to serving as minister, he was secretary for the integration of Mexico's National Development Plan 1995–2000. Jarque also served for 12 years as president of Mexico’s primary statistical body, the Instituto Nacional de Estadística, Geografía e Informática (INEGI), which also deals with geographical information, ICT and land titling. From 1987 to 1989, he served as director of the International Statistical Institute–the first non-European to do so since the institute was founded in 1885. Before that he had directed several Mexican government institutions involved in the areas of social and economic statistics and research.
Jarque has taught in the economics department of the Australian National University and has been a guest professor at Harvard University. He has published nearly 100 articles in the areas of economics, social development, planning and technology. Jarque has received numerous professional distinctions, including the Mexican National Science and Technology Prize and the Adolf Quetelet medal.
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IDB forms environmental partnership with The Netherlands
The Netherlands and the IDB have established a new program that will develop and apply new concepts of environmental and natural resources management into the Bank’s programs.
The Partnership Program in Environment will help to define the IDB's policy framework through the preparation of good practice papers and technical guidelines. At the project level, the partnership will promote the application of new and innovative approaches in Bank activities and encourage the application of lessons learned.
The partnership will focus on the following major areas:
Environmental management. Activities will improve the application of environmental policy instruments and test new and participatory management models and institutional approaches, particularly at the local level.
Integrated water resources management. The program will support Latin American efforts to implement the recommendations of last year's World Water Forum in The Hague.
Climate change. Activities will help the region's policymakers to better understand climate change and to identify their comparative advantages for trading and for institution building.
Biodiversity and forests. The program will help to promote a range of forest and biodiversity uses. In particular, it will promote quantification and payment schemes for environmental services provided by forests and biodiversity.
The initial four-year program (2001–2004) will be funded with $7 million from the Dutch government. The resources will be used to finance consultants, publications, and seminars.
For more information on the Partnership Program in Environment, contact Gil Nolet at gilbertn@iadb.org