The Peterson Institute for International Economics -- arguably the leading economically oriented think tank in the US -- has launched a major new program of research and other activities devoted to India, to be headed by a former senior staffer with the International Monetary Fund, Dr Arvind Subramanium.
Formerly the Institute for International Economics, which renamed itself the Peterson Institute two years ago, 25 years after its founding in honor of the founding chairman of its board of directors, Wall Street titan and benefactor, Peter G Peterson -- an erstwhile Commerce Secretary and founder of the Blackstone Group -- said that Subramanium, who became a senior fellow on April 1, 2007, "is one of the world's leading experts on the economy of India and its role in the world economy."
"He has also worked extensively on growth, trade, development, institutions, foreign aid, oil, Africa, and the World Trade Organization," it added.
The Institute hosted Indian Finance Minister P Chidambaram last month to address the topic of 'India's Growth and Economic Outlook' and then interact with some of the Institute's economists led by Fred Bergsten, the Institute's founding director and Subramanium, whom Chidambaram himself quoted in his address as acknowledging in an IMF working paper in 2004 that "India seems to have large amount of productivity growth from relatively modest reforms."
Bergsten, who was Assistant for International Economic Affairs to the National Security Council in the Nixon White House and Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Carter Administration, said that "the addition of Arvind Subramanium fills the last major gap in the Institute's coverage of leading issues and region's that drive the world's economy."
He noted that "with the earlier arrivals of Nicholas Lardy to address China and Anders Aslund to cover Russia and Eastern Europe, Dr Subramanium's expertise on India will enable the Institute to provide in-depth analysis and policy thinking on all of the major emerging economies while continuing its traditional focus on global economics, trade, and financial and monetary issues along with the main industrialized nations."
Bergsten also announced that he was "proud to note that one of the co-founders and former CEOs of Infosys, Nandan Nilekani, who was also the co-chair of the Incredible India@60 events in New York, has recently joined our board of directors at the Institute."
He said that Nilekani "has been playing a major role in helping guide and inspire the new India program that we are carrying out."
Subramanium served at the IMF from 1992 until early this year and since 2004 as assistant director and head of the Macroeconomics Studies Division in the Research Department.
He worked at the GATT -- the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (the precursor to the World Trade Organization) -- from 1988 to 1992 during the Uruguay Round of trade negotiations and has taught at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government from 1999 to 2000. During his tenure at the IMF, he worked on trade, development, Africa, India, and the Middle East.
Subramanium was co-editor of Efficiency, Equity, and Legitimacy: The Multilateral Trading System at the Millennium, published in 2002 by the Brookings/Harvard University Press and has written widely for academic journals, policy journals, and newspaper columns.
One of Subramanium's initial projects at the Peterson Institute will be an analysis of the effects of, prospects for, and modalities for moving over time toward a free trade agreement between India and the United States.
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