Mariana Mazzucato launches ECLAC report in Buenos Aires

The Director of UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose (IIPP), Professor Mariana Mazzucato, has officially launched her new United Nations-backed report, Transformational Change in Latin America and the Caribbean: A Mission-Oriented Approach, at a prestigious event organised by the UN’s Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) in Buenos Aires, Argentina. 

On Tuesday 25 October, ECLAC hosted the report launch event as part of the 39th ECLAC Annual Sessions, held from 24-26th October 2022. Professor Mazzucato explained that she wrote the report to help progressive governments have a real, workable plan for wealth generation for all. It presents a new approach to industrial strategy to tackle the region’s social and economic challenges, including lagging productivity, weak public sector capabilities, and dependence on natural resources for economic development.  

“The question is, how can we actually solve the big, grand challenges of our time – health, digital divide, climate – but in such a way that is driven by investment and innovation, which, if it works well, can really help us solve or at least address these massive structural issues,” said Professor Mazzucato.

She was joined on stage by Jose Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs, Executive Secretary of ECLAC, Daniel Filmus, Argentina’s Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation, Jose Antonio Ocampo, Colombia’s Minister of Finance, and Luis Felipe López-Calva, Global Director of Poverty and Equity at the World Bank.  

“The history of the region’s development shows that market forces alone cannot solve the problems of growth, investment, employment and poverty. That is why it is more important than ever to harness the opportunity that this moment in time offers: formulating and implementing policies aimed at productive transformation and diversification and that would contribute to social inclusion and environmental sustainability,” said Salazar-Xirinachs.  

At the opening event of the ECLAC Annual Sessions on Monday 24 October, Professor Mazzucato, alongside Professor Joseph Stiglitz, offered keynote remarks on ECLAC’s official position paper, Towards transformation of the development model of Latin America and the Caribbean: production, inclusion and sustainability. She underscored the symbiotic ideas between the two reports and complemented the position paper’s key arguments by emphasising the need for new public sector capabilities, outcomes-oriented tools, and purpose-driven institutions to support productive development. 

On Sunday 23 October, Professor Mazzucato had a private dinner with President Alberto Fernández of Argentina and several of the country’s ministers, including Sergio Massa, Minister of Economy, Santiago Cafiero, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Worship, and Daniel Filmus, Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation. The group had a productive conversation about the challenges the country and the region are facing and how to transform these into opportunities.  

Professor Mazzucato’s time in Buenos Aires is part of a longer trip to Latin America. Having been in Bogotá to meet with the Colombian Government, she is now in Santiago, Chile to bring her report to key decision makers in the Chilean Government.   

For more information 

New Missions for Latin America – Professor Mazzucato explains more about the report in this article for Project Syndicate.  

A recording of the report launch is available on YouTube: -  

• English 
• Spanish 

The full report is available online: -  

• Transformational change in Latin America and the Caribbean: A mission-oriented approach – in English  
• Cambio transformacional en América Latina y el Caribe: un enfoque de política orientada por misiones – in Spanish