The Latin American and Caribbean Economic Association (LACEA) was founded in July 1992 in order to encourage greater professional interaction and foster increased dialogue among researchers and practitioners who focus their work on the economies of Latin America and the Caribbean. As a matter of policy, LACEA welcomes economists of all nationalities, theoretical orientations and policy perspectives.

In 1996, LACEA launched its own annual international meeting. The first meeting took place that year in Mexico City, with the presentation of 157 papers and more than two hundred participants.

LACEA has since expanded its activities in several other directions. Together with the Inter-American Development Bank and the World Bank, it created the Network on Inequality and Poverty in 1998.

LACEA is supported by grants from the Global Development Network, as part of its program on Regional Research Consortia capacity building, and the World Bank’s Development Grant Facility. The Annual Meetings receive grants from The World Bank, The Inter-American Development Bank, The Ford Foundation and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.

Launched in 1998, The Network on Inequality and Poverty is a joint initiative between LACEA, the Inter-American Development Bank and the World Bank that aims to advance the state of knowledge and expertise regarding the causes and consequences of poverty, inequality, and social exclusion, and the whole range of policies, institutions, and social structures that influence their dynamics, as well as the impact of public action. It endeavours to promote the creation and dissemination of high quality research applied to Latin America and the Caribbean.

NIP is organized into fifteen national chapters, which operate with certain autonomy, and an Executive Committee that coordinates the Network and organizes common activities.

The executive committee is composed of five members. Three members are elected from among the Heads of each National Chapter. In addition, the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank have one representative each.

The fifteen national chapters are located in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela. The NIP has more than three hundred members based in 26 countries in the Americas and Europe.

The Argentine chapter is strongly committed to promote the Network objectives. We have been organizing an annual conference on poverty and income distribution since the year 2000, with the support of the Universidad de San Andres, the Universidad Torcuato di Tella and the Universidad de La Plata. The meetings have academic sessions, where researchers from all over the continent have presented their recent work, as well as round tables with policymakers and representatives from international organizations (See Conferences).

We are also promoting high quality research in the region through a series of diverse publications and research projects.

The Argentine chapter has been coordinated by:

• Juan Pablo Nicolini (1998-2001)
  Universidad Torcuato Di Tella

• Sebastián Galiani (2002-2005)
  Universidad de San Andrés

• Leonardo Gasparini (2006-2009)
  Universidad Nacional de La Plata