9-10 May 2019, International Labour Organization, Geneva

First ILO-CEPR-IGC-UNIGE Conference on Labour Markets and Developing Countries - Keynote Speakers

The conference features two keynote talks by Professor Michael Greenstone (University of Chicago and CEPR) and Professor Robert Townsend (MIT and CEPR).

List of participants | 9-10 May 2019, ILO Headquarters, Geneva | 09 May 2019
Contact(s): alvarezs@ilo.org
Keynote Speakers: The conference features two keynote talks by Professor Michael Greenstone (University of Chicago and CEPR) and Professor Robert M. Townsend (MIT and CEPR).

Michael Greenstone is the Milton Friedman Distinguished Service Professor in Economics, the College, and the Harris School, as well as the Director of the Becker Friedman Institute and the interdisciplinary Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago. He previously served as the Chief Economist for President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers, and directed The Hamilton Project, which studies policies to promote economic growth. 
Greenstone’s research, is largely focused on uncovering the benefits and costs of environmental quality and society’s energy choices. His current work is particularly focused on testing innovative ways to increase energy access and improve the efficiency of environmental regulations around the world. Additionally, he is producing empirically grounded estimates of the local and global impacts of climate change as a co-director of the Climate Impact Lab.

Robert M. Townsend is the Elizabeth and James Killian Professor of Economics in the Department of Economics at MIT, an Elected Member of the National Academy of Sciences, a Research Fellow at the Center for Economic Policy Research and a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research. He is a theorist, macroeconomist, and development economist who analyses the role and impact of economic organization and financial systems through applied general equilibrium models, contract theory and the use of micro data. He is known for his seminal work on costly state verification, the revelation principle, optimal multi-period contracts, decentralization of economies with private information, models of money with spatially separated agents, forecasting the forecasts of others, and insurance and credit in developing countries. He is the author of Financial Structure and Economic Organization (1990), The Medieval Village Economy (1993), Households as Corporate Firms (2010) with Krislert Samphantharak, Financial Systems in Developing Economies (2011), Chronicles from the Field (2013) with Sombat Sakuntasathien and Rob Jordan, and numerous professional articles in leading journals. He is twice the recipient of the Frisch Medal, first in 1998 and then in 2012.



Policy Panel: A policy panel will conclude the conference, with the participation of Pamhidzai H. Bamu-Chipunza (Africa Coordinator at WIEGO), Rachel Glennerster (Chief Economist at the UK Department for International Development) and Michelle Leighton (Chief of the Migrant Branch at ILO).

Pamhidzai H. Bamu-Chipunza is the Africa Coordinator within the Law Programme of the Women in Informal Employment: Globalizing & Organizing (WIEGO) network. She holds an LLB, LLM (Labour Law) and a PhD (Labour Law) from the University of Cape Town.
She has worked as a Researcher in the Institute of Development and Labour Law at the University of Cape Town, and the Social Law Project at the University of the Western Cape and has undertaken and published research on various labour issues in South Africa and Southern Africa. She recently completed a Post-Doctoral Research Fellowship at Stellenbosch University.
She was also a consultant to the ILO (Pretoria) on labour migration in SADC (2013-2014) whose work contributed to the development of the SADC Labour Migration Policy Framework, which was endorsed by SADC Labour Ministers in 2014. Pamhidzai was also a consultant to the ILO (Harare and Pretoria) on migrant domestic workers in the Zimbabwe-South Africa corridor in 2014 and to the SADC Secretariat (Gender Unit) on trafficking in persons in the SADC Region from 2014 to 2015. She has also served as a consultant to ILO INWORK on non-standard employment in Africa in 2015 and the ILO Labour Law Reform Unit on the employment relationship in 2017-2018.

Michelle Leighton is Chief of the Labour Migration Branch for the International Labour Organization where she directs the Office’s work on labour migration and mobility, and supports policies and programs related to migrants and refugees. She has expertise in the fields of international law, labour migration, human rights, and economic development, and received her LL.M degree from the London school of Economics and Political Science, London, England in 1987. She serves as an expert appointed to the UNFCCC Task Force on displacement related to climate change, and formerly a member of the World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council on Migration. Ms. Leighton has led global and field research teams, including on linkages between human migration and development, environmental and climate change. She has taught on law faculties in Asia, Europe and the United States and authored numerous publications. Following her service as a Fulbright Scholar in Central Asia, she co-founded the American University of Central Asia’s Tian Shan Policy Center at the American University in Bishkek. She has been an adviser and consultant to international institutions, government, and non-profit organizations, leading technical cooperation projects in the Americas, Africa, Europe and Central Asia. She served as the Munich Re Foundation Chair on Social Vulnerability for the UNU-Environment and Human Security institute, Bonn, Germany, as an expert on the German Marshall Fund’s Trans-Atlantic Study Team on Climate and Migration, and Director of the Center for Law and Global Justice Human Rights Program at the University of San Francisco Law School. Early in her career, she co-founded the NGO Natural Heritage Institute based in San Francisco, leading policy programs related to environment, migration, corporate social responsibility, and human rights.