REGIONAL OFFICE FOR ASIA AND THE PACIFIC (OAP)

Asia Pacific Regional Seminar

Asia and Pacific Economic Outlook: A Year of Difficult Policy Trade-Offs

While the Asia and Pacific region remains the world’s most dynamic, with growth in 2022 expected at 4.9 percent, the region’s recovery faces ongoing headwinds and downside risks, such as spillovers from the Ukraine war and tightening global financial conditions. The IMF Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific hosted a regional seminar with Deputy Managing Director Kenji Okamura and two speakers from the Asia and Pacific Department to  address economic developments and risks in the region. The speakers discussed the difficult tradeoffs facing policymakers, especially given the need to tailor policy responses and calibrate the withdrawal of policy stimulus to support the post-COVID recovery and protect the vulnerable from rising food and fuel prices. The speakers also discussed the Japan-specific outlook.

Agenda:

Speakers:

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  Kenji Okamura assumed office as Deputy Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund on December 3, 2021. Before joining the IMF, Mr. Okamura served as Special Advisor to the Prime Minister of Japan on International Economic Policies. Prior to that position, he was Vice Minister of Finance for International Affairs from 2020-21, Japan’s highest civil servant position in international finance. In this position, he oversaw all international finance work of the Ministry and participated in IMFC, G7, G20, ASEAN + 3, and other meetings, representing Japan as the Finance Minister’s Deputy. Mr. Okamura held a number of high-level positions in the Japanese government, including Director-General of the International Bureau in the Ministry of Finance and Deputy Commissioner of the Financial Services Agency. His extensive experience in international fora also includes his work at the OECD as Vice Chair of the Corporate Governance Committee, and at the World Bank as IDA Deputy for the successful IDA18 replenishment. Mr. Okamura graduated with a Bachelor of Law degree from the University of Tokyo and holds a Master of Public Policy degree from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

  Shanaka Jayanath (Jay) Peiris is currently the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) Asia and Pacific Department’s (APD) Division Chief of Regional Studies in charge of APDs flagship Regional Economic Outlook publication. Before that, he was the Mission Chief for Myanmar and Deputy Division Chief covering ASEAN macro financial Surveillance. Prior to this, his past stints were: IMF’s Resident Representative in the Philippines; Mission Chief to Tonga, and extensive surveillance and program experience in Asia and Africa. He joined the Economist Program at the IMF in 2001 after completing his D. Phil (PhD) in Economics at Oxford University as a British Chevening Scholar. He has published academic journal papers on a wide range of topics including inclusive growth, monetary policy and inflation, bond markets, banking and finance, macroeconomic models for emerging markets and co-edited books on ASEAN and Sub-Saharan Africa.

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  Ranil Salgado is an Assistant Director in the IMF’s Asia and Pacific Department (APD) and the IMF’s mission chief to Japan. He currently also supervises work on the Maldives, Samoa, and Tonga. Among his previous roles in APD, he served as the mission chief to India, the Marshall Islands, Myanmar, and Nepal, as well as chief of the Regional Studies Division and the IMF Resident Representative in Singapore. He has been in the IMF for over 25 years, including in the Western Hemisphere; Research; and Strategy, Policy, and Review Departments. Prior to joining the IMF, he worked in a strategy management consulting firm and as teaching and research assistants at the University of Pennsylvania, Johns Hopkins University, and the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. He attended the University of Pennsylvania (masters & PhD in economics), along with Harvard University (undergraduate in chemistry) and Cambridge University (masters in biochemistry).