Profile

Juan Pablo Perez Castillo, born in Caracas, Venezuela and now living in Bethesda, Maryland (USA), has a masters and doctorate degrees in economics (with honors) from Tulane University (New Orleans, La. USA), as well as a doctorate in law (with honors) also from Tulane University. He is presently doing research and consultancy in economics and finance. He resigned and later retired from the Inter-American Development Bank (Washington), after managing its technical cooperation operations for 13 years, having being Director General for Operations in the OPEC Fund (Vienna) for 2 years, Executive Director representing Venezuela and other countries in the Board of Directors of the IADB for 6 years, and founding member in the Board of Directors of the Venezuelan Investment Fund (1974/75).

Before these full time activities, he had been Professor of Development Planning at Central University of Venezuela in Caracas for 4 years and Professor of Economics and Planning for 10 years at the University's postgraduate Center for Development Studies (CENDES), while also participating in several research projects on the venezuelan economy, using computer models. As head of the Group of Mathematical Models, he coordinated the publication of the research project Estilos de Desarrollo (3v) in 1971, which studied three long-term (30 years) development strategies (styles) of the venezuelan economy.

He is also the author of many studies and articles on planning and development, including problems with the economic development of Venezuela during the last 10 years. He was visiting professor at the Universities of Tulane, Puerto Rico, Guadalajara, El Colegio de Mexico and in Venezuela the Universities of Merida and Zulia; in addition to having been lecturer in several post-graduate seminars in and out of Venezuela; and consultant to several public national and international agencies (Planning, Public Works, Communications, Foreign Trade Institute, Corporacion de Los Andes, UN, OLADE).