Dr. Bernardo M. VillegasVisiting Professor of IESE Business School in Barcelona, Professor at the University of Asia and the Pacific (UA&P) and Research Director of the Center for Research and Communication, Manila
Dr. Bernardo Malvar Villegas is the author of several economics textbooks widely used in Philippine schools and universities. He has also written a number of management best-sellers like The Philippine Advantage, Book of Virtues and Values, Productivity: Path to Global Competitiveness, The Filipino Phenomenon, The Philippines at the Threshold of the Third Millennium, and the Positive Dimensions of Population Growth. He has received several prestigious awards such as the Ten Outstanding Young Men (TOYM), 1972, Fulbright, Johnson Foundation, Asia Foundation and the Instituto de Cultura Hispanica. He is currently a member of the boards of directors or advisory boards of leading national and multinational firms, such as the Benguet Corporation, Alaska Corporation, PHINMA Property Holding Corporation, AES and Transnational Diversified. He served in the boards of Bank of the Philippine Islands, Globe Telecom, Insular Life, McDonalds and IBM. He is a consultant on management development and strategic planning for numerous leading firms operating in the Philippines and Asia Pacific. He has served in the boards of leading non-governmental organizations like the Makati Business Club, Pilipinas Shell Foundation, PHINMA Foundation, the Parents for Education Foundation and the Dualtech Foundation. Through his work at the University of Asia and the Pacific and the Center for Research and Communication, he is often asked to give advice to top government officials in many policy issues, especially in industrial policy and countryside development. He was a member of the Constitutional Commission that drafted the Philippine Constitution under the government of former President Corazon Aquino. He is very often on road shows briefing international audiences on the Philippines and the Asia Pacific region. In July 1992, Dr. Villegas was appointed member of the Council of Economic Advisers of President Fidel Ramos. In July 1998, he was asked by President Joseph Estrada to help promote the Philippines among local and foreign investors. Under the Administration of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, he served as a private sector representative in the boards of the National Development Corporation and the Philippine Infrastructure Corporation. Under the Administration of President Benigno Aquino III, he helped government agencies—both at the national and local levels—to promote investments in the Philippines. He will continue promoting investments in the Philippines under the Duterte Administration, especially in the regions outside the National Capital Region. He served in the Pacific Board of Economics of Time Magazine and writes regularly for both local and international newspapers, such as the International Herald Tribune and the Asian Wall Street Journal.
