Ibrahim Ahmed Elbadawi

Founder and Managing Director, Development Studies & Research Forum (DSRF), since March 2025; Managing Director, the Economic Research Forum (since January 2017- August 2019; August 2020- February 2025). Minister of Finance and Economic Planning, Republic of Sudan (Sept 2019-July 2020). Appointed by the UN Secretary-General to the High-Level Advisory Board on Economic and Social Affairs of the United Nations (in December 2020).

Before joining the ERF, Elbadawi was Director at the Economic Policy & Research Center, the Dubai Economic Council (2009-2016); Lead Economist at the Development Research Group of the World Bank, which he joined in 1989; Research Director of the African Economic Research Consortium (Nairobi, 1993-1998), on external leave from the Bank; and Professor of economics at the University of Gezira in Sudan (1984-1989). He holds a PhD in economics and statistics from North Carolina State and Northwestern universities in the USA.

He has published widely on macroeconomics, growth, democratic transitions and the economics of civil wars and post-conflict transitions. His regional specialization covers Africa and the Middle East.

He is the co-editor (with Ishac Diwan) of the MENA Growth Commission Report (2022). Embarking on a Path of Renewal: MENA Commission on Stabilization and Growth. Policy Research Report No. 43, Economic Research Forum (ERF) and the Finance for Development Lab (FDL), October.

His most recent edited books include:
Ibrahim Elbadawi (with Hoda Selim) of: Understanding and Avoiding the Oil Curse in Resource-rich Arab Economies (Cambridge University Press, 2016); and,

Ibrahim Elbadawi (with Samir Makdisi). Democratic Transitions in the Arab World. (Cambridge University Press: 2016).

https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=zFTreMoAAAAJ
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Ibrahim-Elbadawi-4/research