Claudio González-Vega
Trustee of the BBVA Microfinance Foundation
From 1982 to 2010, Claudio Gonzalez-Vega was Professor of Agricultural, Environmental and Development Economics and Professor of Economics at The Ohio State University (OSU), where he is Professor Emeritus. He was also Director of the Rural Finance Program, a center of excellence in finance and development and received the "Distinguished Policy Contribution" award from the American Agricultural Economics Association in 1989. His theoretical contributions and policy recommendations established him as one of the world leaders in the field. His research has focused on the role of formal and informal finance in reaching marginal clienteles, such as women, microenterprises, and small farmers; the political economy of policy formation and role of the state in financial markets, and (iii) the design of prudential regulation and supervision, particularly of non-bank intermediaries (credit unions, NGOs, state-owned banks).
With degrees from the London School of Economics and Stanford University, he was Dean of Economic Sciences at the University of Costa Rica (1978-82) and founder of Academia de Centroamérica. He has taught at several universities and training centers, including INCAE, The Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, The University of Bergamo, and the Microfinance Training Program of the Boulder Institute. He has published extensively in the areas of finance and development, rural financial markets, microenterprises, macroeconomic management and trade policy in developing countries. He has been a consultant for international agencies and governments (USAID, The World Bank, InterAmerican Development Bank, FAO, UNDP, ECLAC, World Council of Credit Unions, Andean Development Corporation, and governments in over two dozen countries in Latin America, Africa, and Asia). He was a member of the Board of the CGIAR Generation Challenge Program and has been a member of the Board of Trustees of the BBVA Microfinance Foundation, of which he has been Chairman since May, 2015.
BBVA Microfinance Foundation
The BBVA Microfinance Foundation is a non-profit institution created by the BBVA Group in May 2007 as part of its corporate responsibility (CR) strategy, and it focuses its activity on financial inclusion. The Foundation is part of BBVA’s aim to link its community involvement projects with activity in the financial sector wherever possible, specifically in the fight against financial exclusion. The Foundation’s objective is to promote the inclusive and sustainable economic and social development of disadvantaged people by giving them access to Responsible Finance for productive activities, speciality and the methodology of the Foundation. With the backing of a banking institution that has been in the business for more than 150 years, the BBVA Microfinance Foundation is dedicated to helping disadvantaged communities in a completely philanthropic way. The BBVA Microfinance Foundation is completely autonomous, as much as in legal terms , corporate governance and management. It invests its endowment on the creation and consolidation of microfinance institutions in Latin America. Any profits made by them are reinvested in the Foundation’s own activity, and no money goes back to BBVA. This is expressly stated in the Foundation’s bylaws, which safeguards all the funds for the mission and the Foundation’s objectives, thus guaranteeing that the institution will always dedicate its activity to this end.
