GAVI announced that René Karsenti has been appointed as the new Board Chair of the International Finance Facility for Immunisation (IFFIm). Dr. Karsenti joined the Board on 23 December 2011 and will take over as Chair on 24 February, replacing Alan Gillespie, who has served since IFFIm was established six years ago. Under his leadership as Chair, IFFIm has raised US$ 3.6 billion in bonds to support GAVI childhood immunisation programmes.  GAVI said Dr. Karsenti, a French national, “brings to IFFIm a background both in the capital markets and in development finance. He will continue in his current role as President of the International Capital Market Association (ICMA), a self-regulatory organisation and trade body that represents some 430 member firms involved in the international capital markets. On the development side, Dr. Karsenti has served as Director General of Finance of the European Investment Bank and was the first Treasurer of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. He also spent more than 10 years in senior positions in the treasury organisations of the World Bank Group in Washington, including as IFC Treasurer.” Dr. Karsenti said, “GAVI’s mission is very important to me and I am honored to have been given the opportunity to use my capital market experience to raise money for GAVI through IFFIm and so to ensure that children in the world’s poorest countries can be afforded the same vaccinations as children in richer nations. The pioneering work of Alan Gillespie has established IFFIm as a major and innovative model in development finance.”

http://www.gavialliance.org/library/news/press-releases/2012/rene-karsenti-new-chair-iffim-board/