IMF's Gita Gopinath to leave fund and rejoin Harvard University

Economist was promoted to first deputy managing director in 2022 after joining fund as its first female chief economist

Gita Gopinath served as the IMF's chief economist during the Covid-19 pandemic. Reuters

Gita Gopinath, the second-highest ranking official at the International Monetary Fund, will be leaving her role next month to rejoin Harvard University, the IMF said on Monday.

The global lender said, on return to the Ivy League university, Ms Gopinath will become the inaugural Gregory and Ania Coffey Professor of Economics in the Department of Economics. She first joined Harvard in 2005 before being appointed to the IMF as its first female chief economist in 2019.

Ms Gopinath was promoted to first deputy managing director in 2022.

“She came to the Fund as a highly respected academic in macroeconomics and international finance,” IMF managing director Kristalina Georgieva said.

Ms Gopinath served as the fund's chief economist during the Covid-19 pandemic, which Ms Georgieva said was an “unprecedented challenge to our membership”. Ms Gopinath also co-wrote the fund's plan on how to help end the Covid-19 crisis, which the IMF described as a key contribution in setting global vaccination targets at a doable cost.

As first deputy managing director, Ms Gopinath oversaw the fund's surveillance and analysis on fiscal and monetary policy, debt and international trade.

She most recently represented the IMF at the G20 summit in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.

There, she warned that economic uncertainty remains high due to downside risks dominating the global outlook. The fund is due to release its updated global economic forecast later this month.

She also spoke about priorities for policymakers, including building resilience and boosting medium-term growth.

The fund said Ms Georgieva will name Ms Gopinath's replacement “in due course”.

“I am truly grateful for my time at the IMF, first as chief economist and then as first deputy managing director,” Ms Gopinath said.

“I now return to my roots in academia, where, I look forward to continuing to push the research frontier in international finance and macroeconomics to address global challenges, and to training the next generation of economists.”

David Cutler, dean of social science and Otto Eckstein Professor of Applied Economics at Harvard, praised Ms Gopinath's work on exchange rates, capital flows and the global financial architecture.

"Having her back strengthens our standing as a top university for international macroeconomics," he said.