Presentation words by Jon Azúa at the XVIII Raúl Prebisch Chair

Dear colleagues, dear guests and people both present and connected virtually, ladies and gentlemen,

It is a great honor for me to welcome you to the XVIII Raúl Prebisch Chair.

This Chair is a tribute to the memory of Raúl Prebisch, one of the most influential thinkers in our history, but it is also a platform for critical analysis, to think about the future and to enrich our thinking with new ideas that allow us to contribute to the regional conversation on how to move towards more productive, inclusive and sustainable development.

And in fulfilling both objectives the presence today of my good and admired friend, Mr. Jon Azúa, could not be more appropriate and an occasion to celebrate. Thank you very much Jon for accepting our invitation. It is an honor to have him give the 2024 Prebisch Professorship.

In a few minutes I am going to introduce our guest personality today as corresponds to his career and contributions, but precisely to be able to do this better, and put into perspective the meaning of Mr. Azúa’s presence today at the Prebisch Chair of the ECLAC, and with its message for Latin America and the Caribbean, I am going to allow myself a few preliminary words of context.

Raúl Prebisch, with his keen understanding of global dynamics and his ability to challenge conventions, left us a legacy that remains more relevant and important than ever: the need to think and rethink our region from our own reality, from our own needs, but with an eye on the world economy and above all, and I want to emphasize this, with a certain attitude and predisposition: that promoting economic and social development is not a utopia nor should it be thought of from utopian positions, but rather it is something that it’s no only desirable but possible if societies join collective efforts and work hard in that direction.

Prebisch placed productive development and technical progress at the center of his thinking on economic development and his policy recommendations.

He also always maintained great concern for social development, income distribution and equity, but pointed out that redistributive policies without productive development and productivity policies are not conducive to a real and progressive transformation of economies.

In his vision, economic development policies require a deliberate effort from public policies and all relevant actors to accelerate economic growth and change the pattern of economic and social development simultaneously.

And I would affirm that it is because of this framing of the development challenges that Dr. Prebisch gave to ECLAC from the beginning that, despite the semantic changes over time, the issue of productive transformation with equity has been a constant in ECLAC thinking.

Following this tradition of ECLAC thought, which always saw structural change and productive development, that is, productive diversification, technological sophistication and the creation of quality jobs as central development challenges, since I arrived at ECLAC I have concerned and busy taking up these issues strongly.

It is no coincidence that our basic diagnosis sees the countries of the region mired in three mutually reinforcing development traps: one of low capacity to grow; one of high inequality, low social mobility and weak social cohesion; and a third of low institutional capacities and ineffective governance.

We have developed a vision that places as a horizon the achievement of a more productive, inclusive and sustainable development, and as priority areas of action eleven major transformations that the countries of the region require, one of which is precisely the commitment to a major productive transformation .

Furthermore, we are placing great emphasis on answering the question of how to manage these great transformations, including of course the great productive transformation, carrying or landing the answers in a pragmatic way in the areas of governance, TOPP capabilities of the institutions (technical, operational, policies and prospects), the necessary spaces for social dialogue and the political economy of the transformations.

We have written this vision comprehensively in our recent document for the session in Lima, Peru, entitled: “Latin America and the Caribbean facing development traps: indispensable transformations and how to manage them.”

Well, I have made this relatively long introduction as context in order to better put into perspective and introduce our distinguished speaker today.

Jon Azúa is a man of thought and action, or perhaps it is more accurate to say reflective, adaptive and intelligent action, based on a powerful combination: a clear vision of the future complemented by continuous and deep reflection on how to move towards that future. desired.

This is how Jon Azúa successfully led major transformations in the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country from the late 80s until he finished his period of public service, although I must add that even after he stopped holding high-level public positions he has not stopped to have an enormous influence in his beloved Autonomous Community and beyond.

Already in the 1980s he had an important role in the public policy agendas of the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country, where he was Director of Planning and Economic Management of the Department of Transport, Communications and Maritime Affairs between 1980 and 1982; to later become Regional Deputy for Economic Promotion and Development of Bizkaia from 1983 to 1985; Basque Parliamentarian between 1986 and 1988; and Secretary of the Presidency between 1987 and 1988. From these positions he promoted important reforms aimed at economic modernization and sustainable development.

However, his period of great transformational influence was from 1991 when he held the position of Vice President or Vice Lehendakari, and Minister of Industry and Energy of the Basque Government until 1995. During that period Jon was the driver and leader of the great productive transformation of the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country, based on industrial policy and cluster development. In other words, Jon is the father of the cluster policy of the Basque Country, which is one of the most successful experiences of productive transformation in Spain and Europe. To illustrate, let me tell you that in 2017 the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country was ranked as the sixth most competitive region in the European Union.

But his career has not only been institutional in terms of public policies, he also has important academic and business careers.

In academic matters, he was promoter-founder and President of the Advisory Council of the Basque Institute of Competitiveness (Orkestra) from 2003 to 2011; Director of the Basque Chair of Competitiveness at the CEIBS in Shanghai from 2008 to 2010.

He has been a professor and researcher in the MOC Network of the Institute of Strategy and Competitiveness at Harvard University and the Basque Institute of Competitiveness-Orkestra at the University of Deusto and SINTONÍA México.

He has published influential books and numerous articles. The titles of his three best-known books are: “Coopetitive Alliances for the New Economy”; “Clusterizing and Glokalizing the Economy: The Magic of the Process”; and “Bizkaia 2050”, a vision of the future for the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country in 2050.

In business, he is currently an advisor to the Presidency and Director of the Keralty Group, a health business group with a presence in several countries; and is President and founder of Enovating Lab, a platform dedicated to innovation and the transformation of economic, social and business models.

Mr. Azúa was also Vice President of the Sanitas International Organization from 2015 to 2018; Director and General Director of the Bilbao Stock Exchange and Bilbao Plaza Financiera. He has been an advisor to various companies and international institutions on issues of competitiveness, innovation and digital transformation, including the World Economic Forum, the European Union, the Viscaína Savings Bank and many others. He is also currently a member of the governing body of several non-profit organizations, specifically: Innobasque (the Basque Innovation Agency); and the Tecnalia Technology Corporation.

As a personal anecdote, I met Jon Azúa on four visits I made to the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country starting in 2015, in the process of researching the industrial, innovation and cluster policy of that Community, research that gave rise to a small book entitled “Cluster policies and productive development in the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country: Lessons for Latin America and the Caribbean”, which I prepared as Regional Director of the ILO.

And I must confess that Jon Azúa has been a great influence on my ideas about the importance of productive development and cluster policies.

In view of the importance of productive development policies for the great productive transformation that LAC countries require to escape not only the trap of low capacity to grow and transform, but also the trap of high inequality and low social mobility, and in view of Mr. Jon Azúa’s experience on the what, how and why of the PDPs, the enormous relevance of today’s Conference for the region and for the work of ECLAC is more than evident.

Dear Jon, it is a true honor to have you here today to give this prestigious Chair and to join the group of figures of enormous intellectual stature who have accompanied us in this space: Celso Furtado, Joseph Stiglitz, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, Rubens Ricupero, Dani Rodrik, Enrique V. Iglesias, Tulio Halperin, Fernando Savater, Aldo Ferrer, José Antonio Ocampo, Danilo Astori, Luiz Gonzaga de Mello Belluzzo, Rolando Cordera, Mariana Mazzucato, Ricardo Ffrench-Davis, Ha-Joon Chang and Rebeca Grynspan.

The stage is yours.

Thank you so much.