:::IIMB Vista:::

Voice of Experts!

A fleeting glance at the emerging economies paints an extremely competitive picture. Having found a strong foothold after years in the sidelines, these economies are focusing their might into charging ahead. But who is the competition? The other emerging economies or the developed ones? And will it help if there are positive vibes between the new and growing kids on the block?

The evening of day 2 of Vista 2008 will find a panel of eminent business and thought leaders exchanging views on " Emerging Economies, Emerging Realities "

STRATEGIC COOPERATION AMONG EMERGING ECONOMIES

With the growing economic influence of the emerging economies on the world stage, it’s imperative that they leverage their mutual synergies, more so at times of economic downturn in the developed world. Towards this end, we propose the eminent panelists explore the following issues:

Economic Integration: Lowering barriers to flow of trade, investments and human resources across the borders of emerging economies, as they do with respect to their trade relations with the developed economies

Policy Alignment: Is there scope for the emerging economies to bring about more harmonization in various policy areas to address issues such as capital flows, sustainable development, the environment, technology transfer, monetary policy, exchange rate stability, and broader macroeconomic management? Is there scope for them to forge alliances in multilateral and other discussions to address the interests of emerging economies?

Energy Security: Exploring a framework under which the big emerging economies can cooperate with each other, rather than engage in fierce and competitive bidding wars for energy assets around the world

FX Reserves: Investments by sovereign wealth funds of emerging economies in each other’s economies

Impact of Decoupling: Do the emerging economies at large have the resilience to absorb each other’s exports when there is an economic downturn in the developed economies?

	Jayanta ROY has over 30 years post-PhD experience in development economics and policy working for the World Bank and the Government of India. As Economic Adviser in the Ministry of Commerce, he was a part of the team that brought in economic reforms in 1991 that opened up the Indian economy. He has also taught at the World Bank Institute, Cornell University, the University of California at Santa Cruz, the University of Warwick, UK, and the Indian Institute of Management at Calcutta. He is at present Principal Adviser in Confederation of Indian Industry. Dr. Roy holds a PhD in economics from the University of California at Berkeley. He is a regular columnist for the Financial Express.
	Manab Majumdar With a background of over 20 years of research and professional experience in the areas of WTO, Trade Policy, Regional Integration/FTAs, Globalization, Investment and Industry-related issues, Manab Majumdar is currently working as Senior Director of FICCI, the premier apex business Chamber of India. He also serves as Team Leader of WTO and Foreign Trade Division of the Federation. He participated in several WTO Ministerial Conferences and was a member of the Indian official delegation to the Hong Kong Ministerial. Mr Majumdar attended an Advanced Trade Training Course organized by DFID and another training programme under the Swiss Government Fellowship. He was invited by the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs to present a paper in the Symposium on ‘Movement of Natural Persons’, and also by the Ministry of Commerce, Government of Thailand to speak on ‘Implications of the India-Thailand FTA’. He represented the Indian private sector in a large number of national & international conferences and three “High-Level Policy Dialogues on WTO Issues” organized by WTO, UN-ESCAP, Asian Development Bank and International Trade Centre (ITC), Geneva. He is serving as member of various Expert Committees and Working Groups. An alumnus of Presidency College, Calcutta and Jawaharlal Nehru University (New Delhi), he has earlier worked extensively on promotion of India’s trade relations and investment cooperation with South-East and North-East Asian countries. His present responsibilities include interface with Governments, private sector, civil society and multilateral institutions; study of WTO and RTA/FTA-related issues; analyzing their impact & implications; sensitizing and preparing Indian trade and industry to face the challenges of an increasingly WTO-compatible business world.
	Mr. Narayan Ramachandran, Global Head, Emerging Markets Division, Morgan Stanley Narayan Ramachandran is Managing Director and Global co-head of Morgan Stanley's Emerging Markets team. He is also a senior member of the firm's Global Asset Allocation Investment Committee. Mr. Ramachandran joined Morgan Stanley in 1996 and has 17 years of investment banking experience. Prior to joining the Firm, he was a Managing Director at RogersCasey (now CRA RogersCasey).
	Dr. Saikat Sinha Roy is a Reader in the Department of Economics, Jadavpur University, Kolkata, since 2005. He holds an M. Phil. and a Ph.D. in Economics from Centre for Development Studies, Trivandrum, India. Earlier, he completed his Masters from the Department of Economics, Calcutta University. Prior to joining the Jadavpur University, he was a Fellow at the Research and Information System for Developing Countries (RIS), New Delhi. He also worked at the Asian Development Bank (ADB), India Resident Mission, New Delhi. Dr. Sinha Roy’s areas of specialization are Trade and Development, and Open Economy Macroeconomics. His current research interests include Applied Trade Modeling, Exchange Rate Pass-through, Trade, Production Networks and Inclusive Growth, Regional Trading Arrangements, and Market-access related issues under the WTO. He has published extensively in various national and international journals, monographs and also in edited volumes.
	Mr. Gopi Gopinath is currently the Vice President of the Asia pacific operations of AT & T. He is managing the company’s sales and channel teams across all the 13 markets in the Asia pacific region. Mr. Gopi Gopinath brings more than 20 years of experience to this position with a solid track record in the telecom industry, including managing a global telecom company in the Asia Pacific region.