Dionisio Gutiérrez meets with Ricardo Hausmann Director of the International Development Center In Harvard Kennedy School

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Nov 05, 2018, 14:00 ET

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Nov. 5, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Dionisio Gutiérrez, President of Fundación Libertad y Desarrollo (Freedom and Development Foundation) met with Ph.D. Ricardo Hausmann, Director of the International Development Center at Harvard Kennedy School, to discuss the development model that Latin America needs.

Dionisio Gutiérrez began the meeting describing the Guatemalan reality with alarming figures: "Our country had 1.7 million inhabitants a hundred years ago, and now we are 17 million. During the last century, poverty has affected more than 50% of the population. Presently, research indicates that 59% of the Guatemalan people is poor. One, out of every two children who are born in the country, suffers chronicle malnutrition and in the last thirty years, we have had an average net economic growth of 1.3%."

Hausmann stated that the low indicators a country may have, are opportunities to generate welfare, through policies that increase productivity. To Hausmann, the progress of a nation is reached through social cooperation and explained that countries must do great efforts to solve their most imperative problems. "I think that the most profitable investment in Guatemala is to guarantee that no child suffers malnutrition. Fighting childhood malnutrition should be a national obsession; everyone should cooperate with such endeavor."

Later, they spoke about the key elements for the development of countries and both agreed on the importance of counting with a specialized political class. Gutiérrez mentioned Guatemala as an example: "We created Escuela de Gobierno (School of Government), which pursues forming a new generation of leaders, a new political class, new statisticians, and specialists in different fields. It is an institution that holds recovering political values as a basic goal".

Hausmann reflected: "To make the productive sector work effectively, someone should provide security, infrastructure, an educational system, a health system, and a justice system; that is what a government must do. The government needs to be able to manage public resources. Schools of government, such as the one in Guatemala or Kennedy School, have the responsibility of raising leaders and ideas for governments to do their best."

Additionally, Dionisio Gutiérrez took advantage of the visit to interview Dr. Hausmann for the Guatemalan TV show Razón de Estado. The complete show containing such interview can be accessed in the following link: https://goo.gl/QDn91V

SOURCE Fundación Libertad y Desarrollo