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International Monetary Fund’s (IMF’s) C♋hief Economist Gita Gopinath will quit her job in January next year, the global financia🍃l institution announced on Friday.
Go﷽pinath is going back to the prestigious Harvard University’s Economics Department💟.
The 49-year-old prominent Indian-American economist Gopinath had joined the IMF as the Chief Economist📖 in January 2019.
She was the John Zwaanstra Professor of ⛦International Studies and Economics at Harvard University, when she join𒁏ed the Washington-based global lender.
IMF Managing Director Kristalina 🧔Georgieva on Tuesday announced that the search for Gopinath’s successor would begin shortꦛly.
“Gita’s contribution to the Fund and our membership has been truly remarkable - quite simply, her impact on🎶 the IMF’s work has been tremendous,” Georgieva said.
Mysuru-born Gopinath is the first-ever woman Chief Economist of the IMF. She was also the Dire൩ctor of the Re♔search Department of the IMF.
Harvard University had extended her lꦐeave of absence on an exceptional basis by one year, which has allowed her to serve as Chief Economistꦬ at the IMF for three years.
“She made history as the first female Chief Economist of the Fund and we benefited immensely from her sharp intellect and deep knowledge of international finance🅘 and macroeconomics as we navigate through the worst economic crisis since the Great Depreꦯssion.
“Gita also wo♋n the respect and admiration of c♓olleagues in the Research Department across the Fund, and throughout the membership for leading analytically rigorous work and policy-relevant projects with high impact and influence,” Georgieva said.
The IMF said that as part of her many significant initiatives, Gopinath co-authored the “Pandemic Paper” on how to end the COVID-19 pandemic that se🤡t globally endorsed targets for vaccinating the world.
This work led to the creation of the Multilateral Task Force made up of the leadership of the IMF, the World Bank, the World Trade Organisation and the World Health Organisation to help end the pandemic and the establishment of a working group with vaccine manufacturers to identify trade barriers, supply bottlenecks, and accelerate delivery of vaccines to low- and lower-middle income 🍷countries, the IMF said in a statement.
Among her other ke📖y accomplishments, Gopinath helped set up a Climate Change team inside the IMF to analyse, among other things, optimal clim🐠ate mitigation policies.
“I would like to express my personal appreciation to Gita for her impr𒆙essive contributions, her always wise counsel, her devotion for the mission of the Research Department and the Fund more broadly, as well as her widely recognised inclusive and accessible approach to colleagues and staff,” Georgieva added.
Later, in a tw𝓡eet, Gopinath thanked h🎶er colleagues for making her stint at the IMF truly gratifying.
"My immense gratitude to all my amazing colleagues at @IMFNews who make working at the IMF truly gratifying. I look forward to continue working with them the next few months before my return to @Harvard," shౠe wrote.
Born in December 1971 to Malayalee parents, Gopinath had her schooling in Kolkata and graduated from the Lady Shri Ram College🌜 of Commerce in Delhi. She did Masters from the Delhi School of Economics as well as from the University of Washington.
Gopinath did her Ph.D in economics 🦹from Princeton University in 2001 and she was guided by Kenneth Rog꧂off, Ben Bernanke and Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas.
She joined the University of Chicago in 2001 as an Asཧsistant Professor before 𓆉moving to Harvard in 2005. She became a tenured Professor there in 2010.
She is the third woman in the history of Harvard to be a tenured professor at its esteemed econom꧋ics department and the first Indian since the Nobel laureate Amartya Sen to hold that position. (With PTI inputs)
