World renowned economist Professor Steve Hanke is due in Accra for a roundtable on economics, BanglaWebTools.com has learned.
The IEA will be hosted by the Ghana Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) Professor of Applied Economics at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, who is also a senior fellow and director of the Troubled Currency Project at the libertarian Cato Institute in Washington, DC. sources told BanglaWebTools.com.
The forum that Professor Steve Hankey will address is expected to be a frank academic debate and discussion on some theories and solutions to Ghana’s current economic problems.
Professor Hanke, who is Co-Director of the Institute of Applied Economics at Johns Hopkins University, will join a panel with IEA Research Chief Dr. John Kwake, IEA Senior Economists Fellows, Dr. Eric Osei-Asibi, Professor Alex Darko, and Professor John Asafo Adjaye among others.
The date and time of the event has not been announced.
Professor Hanke who in the past two months has been critical of the Akufo-Addo government’s management of the economy is expected to discuss his proposal to introduce a currency board as a solution to the free fall of the cedi against major trade currencies.
Steve Hanke has been considered by many to be a serial critic of the Ghana government who blames Ken Ofori-Ata and Akufo-Addo for willful mismanagement and ignorance in economic management.
“By my calculations, the Ghanaian cedi has fallen by 34.17% against the US dollar since January 2020, which is why Ghana is 15th on Hanke’s currency watchlist for this week,” one of his tweets said.
“To save the cedi,” he said, “Ghana must stop its central bank and install #CurrencyBoard.”
Professor Steve Hanke is Professor of Applied Economics]at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland. He is also a senior fellow and director of the turbulent currencies project at the libertarian Cato Institute in Washington, D.C., and co-director of the Johns Hopkins University Institute for Applied Economics, Global Health, and the Study of Entrepreneurship in Baltimore, Maryland. .
Haneke is known for his work as a currency reformer in emerging market countries. He was a senior economist on President Ronald Reagan’s Council of Economic Advisers from 1981 to 1982, and has advised heads of state throughout Asia, South America, Europe, and the Middle East. He is also known for his work on currency boards, dollarization, hyperinflation, water pricing and demand, utility cost analysis, privatization, and other topics in applied economics.
Hanke has written extensively as a columnist for Forbes, The National Review, and other publications. He is also a currency and commodity trader. Hanke has been accused of spreading disinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and has been included by the Ukrainian government on the Russian propaganda list.
