Johan Swinnen is Professor of Development Economics and Director of LICOS Center for Institutions and Economic Performance at the KU Leuven.

From 2003 to 2004 he was Lead Economist at the World Bank and from 1998 to 2001 Economic Advisor at the European Commission. 

He has been advisor to many international institutions and governments.  His research focuses on institutional reform and development, globalization and international integration, media economics, and agriculture and food policy.  His latest books are “Global Supply Chains, Standards, and the Poor” and “From Marx and Mao to the Market”.  

He has been a guest editor for World Development, Development Policy Review, The World Economy, theEuropean Review of Agricultural Economics, and is associate editor of the American Journal of Agricultural Economics.

He is also a senior research fellow at the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS), Brussels; coordinator of the European Network of Agricultural and Rural Policy Research Institutes (ENARPRI); member of the Advisory Committee of the Regoverning Markets Global Project; and of the Programme Committee of the International Agricultural Trade Research Consortium (IATRC). He holds a Ph.D from Cornell University.

As the chair of the Beeronomics Society he will share his views on the economics of beer and how it has impacted our Belgian economy.