The IMF course on Inclusive Growth

After it was offered for the last time at the JVI as a virtual course in 2021, the two-week IMF course on Inclusive Growth took place again as a face-to-face course at the JVI during November 6-17, 2023. 23 participants from 14 different countries came primarily from ministries of finance or economy, and a few of them from central banks. 

This course was designed to increase participants’ understanding of inclusive growth and give them analytical and operational tools to evaluate, measure, and monitor how macroeconomic policies can affect growth, climate change, poverty, inequality, and job creation. It also covered the challenges to inclusion from longer-term structural trends such as demographics and climate change. Lectures introduced the basic concepts of inclusive growth, with a special focus on long-term sustainability, while workshops offered participants an opportunity to apply the concepts and think about the design of inclusive growth strategies, drawing from country case studies.

It was organized and delivered jointly by the IMF’s Institute for Capacity Development and the JVI. In addition, the course benefited from guest lectures by UNICEF, the Austrian National Bank (OeNB), the Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies (wiiw), and the IMF’s European Department. The course also included multi-session group work, an interactive quiz game, and an in-person JVI seminar. The latter featured the October 2023 IMF Regional Economic Outlook for Europe, which discussed the links between labor markets trends and inflation, and was opened by the OeNB Governor Robert Holzmann.

The course was very well received as shown in the very high overall satisfaction ratings provided by participants in the end-of-course evaluation. Participants stressed that the course improved their ability to provide policy advice in their respective countries and they appreciated the practical utility of the tools applied. Many of them plan to use the knowledge gained to identify inclusive growth shortcomings, to prioritize development projects, or as part of ongoing projects related to poverty and inequality measurement. 

The Inclusive Growth course will again be delivered at the JVI next year, from June 3-14, 2024.

Markus Eller, Senior Economist, JVI