The Asian Development Bank’s (ADB) Board of Governors has unanimously reelected Haruhiko Kuroda as the new President of the bank for a five year tenure beginning November 24, 2011. A statement issued by the bank on Thursday said that Kuroda was first elected ADB President in November 2004, officially assuming office on February 1, 2005 to complete the term of former President Tadao Chino.
He was subsequently reelected for a full five-year term beginning November 2006. Kuroda is the eighth President of the bank. Under his tenure, ADB adopted a new long-term strategy charting the Bank’s strategic course to the year 2020, refocusing ADB’s operational agenda on inclusive, environmentally sustainable economic growth and regional cooperation. During Kuroda’s tenure the ADB has tripled its capital base from $55 billion to $165 billion, and significantly bolstered its lending window, Asian Development Fund, enabling ADB to push forward on mainstreaming climate change and strengthening support to countries in fragile and conflict-affected situations among others.
“I am honored by the decision of ADB’s Board of Governors to serve a second five-year term and look forward to the challenges ahead,” said Kuroda. “While countries in Asia and the Pacific have made remarkable progress since I first joined ADB over six years ago, we must not forget that the region is still home to hundreds of millions of the world’s poorest people. There is still much work to be done,” he said. Before joining ADB, Kuroda was Special Advisor to the Cabinet of Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and a professor at the Graduate School of Economics at Hitotsubashi University in Tokyo.
In a career spanning nearly four decades, Kuroda has represented Japan’s Ministry of Finance at a number of international monetary conferences as Vice Minister of Finance for International Affairs. Born in 1944, Kuroda holds a BA in Law from the University of Tokyo and a Master of Philosophy in Economics from the University of Oxford.
