Office at the United Nations, New York

The United Nations University (UNU) is pleased to announce the appointment of Professor Finn Tarp as the next Director of the UNU World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER). Director-Designate Tarp will take up the post on 1 September 2009. He succeeds Prof. Anthony Shorrocks, who served as UNU-WIDER Director from 1 January 2001 through 30 April 2009.

Since 2002, Prof. Tarp has been professor of development economics with the Department of Economics, University of Copenhagen, and since 2006 has also served as chair in development economics. Prior to that, he worked with the Institute of Economics at the university as associate professor and assistant professor and he also has served as coordinator of the Development Economics Research Group, a collaborative research initiative involving staff and Ph.D. students of the university's Department of Economics.

"I welcome Prof. Tarp to the UNU family," said UNU Rector Konrad Osterwalder. "I am confident that he will take the UNU's leading development economics institute in Helsinki to a new level of quality, activity, and outreach."