UNESCAP-USAID Roundtable on BIMSTEC: Post-Summit Progress and Way Ahead

Mr. Manu Sithiprasasana, Executive Director of International Institute for Trade and Development (ITD), was established by UNCTAD and the Royal Thai Government.

Mr. Manu Sithiprasasana holds a Master's Degree in Political Science focusing on International Relations from Chulalongkorn University. Over 4 years of posting at ITD, his vast experience covers a wide array of expertise, including Project Leader of BOI Project: Thai Overseas Investment Training Course, Administration Leader of Regional Trade Policy Course, a joint programme for Government Officer in Trade and Commerce in the Asia Pacific with WTO, Chulalongkorn University, and ITD. Especially, Mr. Manu is an exponent in the field of Sales and Marketing Management, Public Administration Management, Policy Analysis, and proficient in Social Services in both public and private sectors, such as Japanese Shipping Line, Thai-Hongkong Shipping Line, Thai-Taiwanese Transport Co., Shinawatra Directory Co., and as well as, Advisor to Bangkok Governor, Big Trees Group and more. 

Ms. Rupa Chanda is the Director of Trade, Investment and Innovation. Prior to that, she was a Professor of Economics at IIM Bangalore and the Dean of Programmes at the institute. She has worked as an Economist at the IMF and briefly served as Head, UNESCAP Subregional Office for South and South-West Asia in New Delhi. Prof. Chanda received her PhD in Economics from Columbia University and her Bachelor’s from Harvard University. She teaches Macroeconomics and International Trade and has received teaching awards. Her research interests include the WTO, trade in services, regional integration and migration. She hasundertaken research and professional assignments forinternational and Indian organizations and has published extensively in the form of books, journal articles, book chapters, and reports. She is active professionally as a research guide, reviewer, and member of several expert committees. She was member of the WHO’s Review Committee on the functioning of the International Health Regulations (2015-16) and  the WHO’s Expert Advisory Group, International Recruitment of Health Personnel (2019-20).

Mr. Yann Duval is currently Chief of Trade Policy and Facilitation at ESCAP, the regional branch of the United Nations Secretariat for Asia and the Pacific.

Over the past 15 years, Mr. Duval has conducted research and delivered technical assistance and advisory services on trade policy and facilitation throughout Asia and the Pacific, including on the WTO Trade Facilitation Agreement. He spearheaded the development of the Asia-Pacific Research and Training Network on Trade (ARTNeT), as well as the creation of the ESCAP-World Bank Trade Cost Database and the UN Global Survey on Trade Facilitation and Paperless Trade Implementation. Mr. Duval was also instrumental in the development of the United Nations Network of Experts for Paperless Trade and Transport in Asia and the Pacific (UNNExT) and the negotiation of a new intergovernmental Framework Agreement on Facilitation of Cross-Border Paperless Trade in Asia and the Pacific, adopted as a UN treaty in 2016.

Prior to joining the UN, He held faculty positions at the Asian Institute of Technology and Washington State University, USA.

Nihal Pitigala is an economist with over 20 years of experience providing analytical and advisory work to promote sustainable trade and market-led development in Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East. Dr. Pitigala brings extensive expertise in diagnosing and assessing the impacts of regional trade agreements and trade policy reforms (including qualitative and quantitative modelling), regional and global value chains and standards and has published numerous peer reviewed articles. Dr. Pitigala is currently engaged by the World Bank to develop a strategy for the regional integration of four Sahel countries in West Africa. He was previously engaged as the Lead Economist for a USAID/State Department contracted initiative on Pan African regional integration program. He has similar experience in across South, Central and East Asia. At the World Bank, Dr. Pitigala supported both research (Development Economics Research Group) and operational work (PREM Trade Group)—this included several policy papers on trade policy as part of CEM or PRSP and through recent Diagnostic Trade Integration Strategies in Asia and Africa. He also helped the development of the World Bank Group’s (Prem-Trade) Trade Strategy, 2011-2021. He obtained a PhD in Economics from the University of Sussex. His selected areas of expertise and recent experience include:

• Regional and Multilateral Trade Analysis and Negotiations—Diagnostics of regional trade integration, including regional communities in Africa (EAC, COMESA, SADC, ECOWAS, EU-EPAs), in Asia include (SAFTA, ASEAN, APTA, BIMSTEC, TPP and bilateral FTAs), MENA (GAFTA, Agadir), and Latin America (MERCOSUR). Co-manager of the World Bank’s technical assistance to developing countries in preparation for the WTO Doha and Uruguay Rounds.

• Trade Facilitation: diagnostics of trade frictions across trade and transport corridors in Central Asia. Programs facilitating the implementation of WTO TFA. Recent lecture series for policy-makers in East Asia on the implementation of the WTO TFA.

• Trade Competitiveness—analytical/empirical and policy work on trade policy reforms, export competitiveness, and trade diagnostics (DTISs) and development strategies, analytical/empirical work on vertical integration (of regional and global value chains) and export diversification.

• Investment policy and business enabling environment of SMEs—policy, legal, regulatory and institutional reforms to improve investment climate/business enabling environment.

• Other skills: Stata, SPSS, Experience in econometric analysis using GTAP, Partial Equilibrium, gravity modelling. a proven track record of effective communication and liaison with senior government officials. Training of government staff on trade integration, strategic trade and export policies and trade and investment regulatory reform.

Professor Selim Raihan is a Professor at the Department of Economics, University of Dhaka, Bangladesh and the Executive Director of the South Asian Network on Economic Modeling (SANEM). He holds a PhD from the University of Manchester, UK.

Professor Raihan is the Honorary Senior Research Fellow at the University of Manchester, UK. He is an alumnus of Harvard University’s program on “Cutting Edge of Development Thinking”. He possesses vast expertise in empirical research on international trade, economic growth, poverty, labour market, macroeconomic policies, political economy, and climate change issues. He has worked quite extensively on applied economics, especially assessing impacts of trade and economic policies, using country-specific and global Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) models, and micro and macro-econometric modelling and estimation techniques. He has a long experience in teaching international trade, economic modelling, quantitative economics, econometrics, development economics, and poverty dynamics. He has more than 15 years of experience in conducting international and national training programmes on economic modelling in various countries, including Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Mongolia, Senegal, Sri Lanka, and Thailand. He has published several journal articles, books, book chapters and working papers.

Professor Raihan is the editor of Thinking Aloud – a monthly digest from SANEM. He regularly writes columns in leading English and Bengali dailies in Bangladesh. He contributed extensively to the preparation of the Sixth and Seventh Five-year National Plans of Bangladesh. He led a research team to prepare the SDG Financing Strategy: Bangladesh Perspective -a flagship publication of the Planning Commission of Bangladesh. He has worked for several national and international organizations including the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank, UNDP, UNESCAP, UNCTAD, IFPRI, the Commonwealth Secretariat, FAO, European Commission, ILO, IDRC, DFID, etc. He has led and has also been a member of a number of regional and international research projects on trade and regional integration issues. Also, he has been working on the political economy analysis of economic issues. The most recent ones are the studies on Bangladesh Institutional Diagnostic, which are prepared under his leadership and supervision, for the DFID, UK.

Ms. Daria Taglioni is Research Manager, Trade and International Integration, Development Research Group. She joined the World Bank Group in 2011 as Senior Trade Economist in the International Trade Department of the Poverty Reduction and Economic Management Network (PREM). Since then, she has held various positions and roles, including Team-Task Lead for the World Development Report 2020, Principal Economist in the International Finance Corporation, and World Bank’s Global Lead on Global Value Chains. Previously, she worked as Senior Economist at the European Central Bank (ECB) and as Economist at the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). She has published in the American Economic Review, Journal of International Economics, and other scholarly journals. Her work has been featured in international media outlet such as the New York Times and Forbes. She authored various books on international trade. She is Italian and holds a Ph.D. in International Economics from the Graduate Institute, Geneva.

Dr. Tengfei Wang is currently an Economic Affairs Officer at UNESCAP. Prior to February 2008 when he joined the UNESCAP, he was a Senior Lecturer in Transport/Logistics/Supply Chain Management at the University of Plymouth, United Kingdom. He is the author or coauthor of a book and over 30 published peer-reviewed research papers and acted as the chairman of International Association of Maritime Economists 2008 annual conference. Dr Wang was the winner of PhD competition (2002-2005), The 'Palgrave Macmillan' Prize in Maritime Economics and Logistics. The award is for the best PhD thesis successfully defended during 2002-2005 in the field of maritime economics and logistics, as determined by an international jury comprising all members of the editorial board of Maritime Economics and Logistics (MEL).

Ms. Sanchita Basu-Das is Economist at the Regional Cooperation and Integration Division of the Economic Research and Regional Cooperation Department of ADB. She contributes to the division’s flagship publications, knowledge products and analytical studies. Her core research interests include regional cooperation initiatives and issues related to them, such as trade, logistics, industrial corridors, tourism, digital economy, institutions and others. Sanchita has published in international journals including the Singapore Economic Review, Journal of World Trade and Asia Pacific Economic Literature, authored/ edited books and book chapters and wrote for media. Sanchita joined ADB in November 2018 and initially served as an Economist in the South Asia Regional Department.

Prior to joining the ADB, Sanchita was the Lead Researcher for Economic Affairs at the ASEAN Studies Centre of ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute, Singapore. She was concurrently a Fellow of the Regional Economic Studies Program, coordinator of Singapore APEC Studies Centre and a co-editor of Journal of Southeast Asian Economies (JSEAE), all housed under the same institute. Sanchita earned her PhD in International Political Economy from Nanyang Technology University, Singapore, and her Masters in Economics and Business Management from the University of Delhi and the National University of Singapore respectively.

Mr. Prabir De is Professor at the Research and Information System for Developing Countries (RIS). He is also the Coordinator of ASEAN-India Centre (AIC) at RIS. De works in the field of international economics and has research interests in international trade and development. He was a visiting Fellow of the Asian Development Bank Institute (ADBI), Tokyo; and visiting Senior Fellow of United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP), Bangkok. He has been conducting policy research for the Government of India and several international organizations. De has a Ph.D. in Economics from the Jadavpur University, Calcutta. He has contributed several research papers in international journals and written books on trade and development. He is the managing editor of South Asia Economic Journal, published by Sage.