PhD Project

The Effect of Foreign Direct Investment and Official Development Assistance on Job Creation and Poverty Reduction

(The research project is part of ADAPTED, a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Innovative Training Network project funded by the European Union under the Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme which is coordinated by the IEE.)

The PhD project investigates how to integrate job creation and poverty reduction in developing countries into models of economic growth and identifies the different transmission channels that may exist between foreign direct investment and official development assistance on the one hand and job creation, poverty reduction and economic growth on the other. The project will empirically test the suggested transmission channels using panel data regressions and will contrast the results with estimations based on extended neoclassical growth models. Data sources: WDI, PWT, Conference Board, OECD.

Supervisors:
Prof. Dr. Wilhelm Löwenstein (Institute of Development Research and Development Policy, RUB),
Prof. Dr. Liza Chauvet (Centre d’Economie de la Sorbonne UP1, Centre National de Recherche Scientifique)

Education

Mr. Muhammad Saleh holds a Master Degrees in Economics from the University of Punjab, Pakistan and another Masters from the Applied Economics Research Centre (AERC), University of Karachi, Pakistan. He has also graduated in Development Studies with specialization in Economics of Development from the International Institute of Social Studies (ISS), Erasmus University Rotterdam, Netherlands.

Experience

Previously, he has worked with the SDGs Section at Planning Commission of Pakistan where he was responsible for estimating both CBN and MPI based poverty headcounts and analyzing poverty and inequality dynamics in Pakistan. He has also assisted in coordinating and monitoring the implementation of SDGs agenda; improving data ecosystem for better SDGs reporting and aligning and mainstreaming Agenda 2030 at the plan, policy and execution levels in Pakistan. He has also served as the focal person for administering the World Bank social sector development assistance where he successfully led the work of preparing, negotiating and managing all kick-off arrangements for FATA Temporary Displaced Persons (TDPs) Emergency Recovery Project worth of US$ 75.00 million. He has also the experience of economic and technical appraisal of social sector development projects particularly in population and rural development sectors. With research interests in the fields of Development Economics and Political Economy with increased focus on subjects of poverty, human capital development, development finance and economic growth he has been writing on economic issues and made scholarly contributions for the international refereed scholarly journals.