News Release

Brookings Scholar Warwick McKibbin Appointed to the Board of the Reserve Bank of Australia

August 2, 2001

Professor Warwick J. McKibbin, a non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, has been appointed to a five-year term as a member of the Board of the Reserve Bank of Australia, a body roughly similar to the Federal Reserve Board in the United States.

A statement from the office of the Australian Treasurer, which appoints the Board members, stated that “with his highly respected academic credentials and wide expertise in domestic and international macroeconomics, Professor McKibbin will make a valuable contribution to the Board of the Reserve Bank of Australia.”

McKibbin joins eight other members on the Board.

“Warwick is one of the most innovative and technically proficient economists in the world today and we are proud that the Australian government has recognized his talent by appointing him as a Board member of its central bank,” said Robert E. Litan, vice president and director of Economic Studies at the Brookings Institution.

McKibbin is a professor of international economics at the Australian National University’s Research School of Pacific & Asian Studies, and executive director of the Economic Division in the Asia Pacific School of Economics and Management.

McKibbin has written extensively on international economics for the Brookings Institution, most recently proposing a global climate change system of permits designed to reduce carbon emissions through economic incentives rather than setting compulsory limits. He recently visited Washington to discuss his proposal, which is being considered by the United Nations as well as the U.S. and a number of other governments.

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