Meet the team
The SAIER is guided by a Board of Directors appointed by the sponsoring members. The Directors represent the Ministry of Economic Planning and Development, the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning, the private sector, the civil society and SAIER itself. The Board is responsible for setting policy, providing support for the activities of the Institute, and for approving the annual work programme and budget. The Secretariat itself consists of an Executive Director who carries out research and supervises research programmes; a Research Co-ordinator who carries out research and administrative functions; and a Secretary/Administrative Assistant. Most of the research is done by experts outside SAIER through networking.
The two researchers who have established the Institute have the requisite experience of many years. Their combined experience covers, among other areas: teaching economics at University, heading/administering a University economics department; economics work at the IMF and at a central bank; establishing and heading/administering an economics department at a commercial bank; advising on economic and financial policy matters; preparing and presenting at local and international gatherings various research papers relating to economic policy and publishing many of them under the banner of SAIER; as well as consultancy on a wide range of economic issues with several local and international organisations. Thus, the Institute is led by people who themselves have considerable experience in economic policy research and administration. Due to inadequate resources, SAIER does not have in-house staff for its activities. Instead, it relies on networkers. Apart from Prof. C. Chipeta, the core of these networkers that does the bulk of its work are:
Prof. Chinyamata Chipeta
Executive Director
Professor Chinyamata Chipeta holds a PhD from Washington University in the USA, having obtained a BSc (Econ), (London), an MA from Yale, and another MA from Washington in the USA. In his academic career, he rose from being a Lecturer in Economics to a Professor of Economics. He taught a wide range of undergraduate and postgraduate courses in economics to a number of today’s prominent Malawian economists. At SAPES Trust in Harare, Zimbabwe, he taught MA students and served as External Examiner for Economic Analysis and Development and Regional Cooperation and Integration courses for the Masters in Policy Studies degree programme. At the African Economic Research Consortium (AERC) Joint Facility for Electives in Nairobi, he taught and examined PhD Development Economics.
With financial support from the AERC, African-American Scholars Council, SAPES Trust, ODI, University of Malawi Research and Publications Committee and others, he carried out several research projects which led to the publication of numerous research papers and books. He was a member of various University-wide academic and administrative committees, including Senate. He was also on the Editorial Board of the Journal of Social Science.
Other work experience locally and internationally included work in the Ministry of Finance, as Assistant Executive Director, International Monetary Fund, carrying out macro-economic and balance of Payment analysis for a group of African countries, world and regional economies in connection with the quarterly World Economic Outlook Review, taking decisions on general Fund policies and making recommendations to the Board of Governors on various matters of interest.
In his service to the community and resulting from his expertise in Economics, Professor Chipeta has served on a number of Boards for public and private organisations as a Director and/or Chairman, e.g. Press (Holdings) Ltd and later Press Corporation, Ltd; Press Transport Ltd; Commercial Bank of Malawi, Ltd; Import and Export Co, Ltd; Malital, Ltd; Oilcom (1978); Press Investment Trust Holdings, Ltd; Malawi Development Corporation; Reserve Bank of Malawi, Monetary Policy Committee of Reserve Bank of Malawi; and National Council for Higher Education.
Throughout his career, Professor Chipeta has carried out an extensive number of consultancies for major national and international organisations, such as: UNESCO (2); OECD (1); UNECA (1); UNDP (3); UNICEF (3); Malawi Government (3); SADC (19); COMESA (4); AERC (7); AURORA (3); SATUCC (1); Friedrich Ebert Foundation (2); AFRODAD (4); ILO (3); ACBF (2); World Bank (3); IUCN (1); AfDB (1); Southern Africa Trust (1); APRM (1); Centre for Social Research (1); Economics Department, Chancellor College (3); USAID (2); W.K. Kellogg Foundation (1); UN-OSCAL (1).
Dr. Angella Faith Montfaucon
Research Fellow
Angella Faith Montfaucon (Nee: Lapukeni) is an economist who works on trade policy, exchange rates, financial sector development and fiscal policy. She received her Ph.D. in Economics from Yokohama National University in Japan, and an MA in Economic Policy Management from University of Zambia and bachelor’s from the University of Malawi. She is in the 2019 cohort of the globally competitive and prestigious World Bank Young Professional's Program.
Prior to this, Angella worked at the Reserve Bank of Malawi as a Fiscal Analyst for nearly five years where her work focused on analysis of the day to day central government operations using transaction-level fiscal data and the interactions with monetary policy. Angella also has private sector banking experience having worked at 2 commercial banks in Malawi and University teaching experience. She has published on financial inclusion, trade integration and invoice currency choice and enjoys writing music, poetry, blogging, singing and exercise. For more information, please visit www.angella.montfaucon.info
Mrs. Esmie Kanyumbu
Research Fellow
Esmie Koriheya Kanyumbu is an economist and a researcher. Her research interests include financial inclusion, financial markets development, monetary policy, financial stability and international trade. She holds an MA in Economics and a Bachelor of Social Science from the University of Malawi. She is currently a PhD researcher at Loughborough University in the UK under the supervision of Prof. Christopher Green and Dr Kavita Sirichand. Her PhD thesis focuses on interbank markets and their effectiveness in low-income countries.
Esmie works for the Reserve Bank of Malawi (RBM) and is experienced in liquidity forecasting, financial markets analysis, monetary policy analysis and implementation, global markets research, financial stability, financial markets development and risk management. While working at the RBM, Esmie has been involved in the creation of the Export Development Fund, organizing and facilitating stakeholder workshops on topical issues in the Malawi financial markets and beyond. She has been a member of the Financial Stability Technical Committee and has been making presentations and contributing at the Monetary Policy Technical Committee meetings. She has undergone a number of trainings organized by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank (WB), the Macroeconomic and Financial Management Institute of Eastern and Southern Africa (MEFMI) and the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA). Such trainings include financial programming, monetary and exchange rate policies and risk measurement and management.
She is an established researcher within the African Economic Research Consortium (AERC) and held a Visiting Scholar position at the IMF in Washington DC in 2018. She is a research fellow at the Southern Africa Institute for Economic Research (SAIER).