18 Apr 07

The newly formed Oxford Centre for the Analysis of Resource-Rich Economies (OxCarre) has been launched at BP's headquarters in London. Professor Tony Venables, Chief Economist at the UK Department for International Development and Professor of International Economics at the London School of Economics, will lead OxCarre and takes up his new post this month as the first BP Professor of Economics.

With BP funding of about $14m, OxCarre, which is part of Oxford University's Department of Economics, is expected to become a global centre of excellence in the analysis of resource-rich economies. BP Chief Executive Lord Browne of Madingley said: 'I believe this Centre has a great role to play in providing detailed analysis of the experience of resource-rich countries and a role in offering objective and independent advice to governments, civil society and business on the best ways in which to manage revenues in difference economic circumstances. Its role is grounded in the legitimacy which comes with academic independence.'

Professor Venables, who spoke at the presentation marking his appointment, said: 'I think this topic and the Centre offers an absolutely fantastic combination of intellectual challenge and practical policy challenge, ranging across wide areas of economics. Very importantly on the practical policy side, it is such an area of lost opportunity for many countries and such an area where I feel that economics can really make a difference. African exports have doubled over the past ten years, more than two thirds of that is natural resource exports. So getting this right is fundamentally important for Africa as it is to many other countries around the world.

'The Centre will have its core activities located within the Economics Department of the University of Oxford, but it is also going to be very important that we have links with the wider University of Oxford. The University has great strength in development economics, economic theory, econometrics, the Centre for the Study of African Economies, the Energy Institute, and many other important disciplines which our work can benefit from. We hope the Centre will be part of a wider network outside the University, with those people working on these questions in academia, and outside academia in business and in the policy community.'

Professor Rick van der Ploeg, currently Professor of Economics (Public Finance and International Macroeconomics) at the European University Institute, Florence, and Professor of Political Economy at the University of Amsterdam, has accepted the post of Deputy Director of OxCarre. With further appointments to its staff expected over the coming months, the Centre is expected to be operating at the start of the next academic year and a first research conference, hosted by the Centre, is currently planned for late 2007.