ABSTRACT
Hossein Askari received his Ph.D. in Economics in 1970 from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He has been an adviser to Executive Director at the International Monetary Fund and adviser to the Minister of Finance of Saudi Arabia. For the last three years he was the Director of the Economics and Finance Department of the Consulting Center in Riyadh; in this capacity he directed the development of energy planning models (international, domestic and GCC) for the Ministry of Planning of Saudi Arabia. He is currently visiting professor of International Finance at George Washington University. Babak Dastmaltschi has for the last three years been directing efforts to design and develop the Long-term Energy Plan for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. He has also done numerous feasibility studies for industrial projects in the GCC. He is currently a consultant on issues of privatization to the Ministry of Finance of Saudi Arabia.
