The South African Reserve Bank (Sarb) has appointed Fundi Tshazibana an adviser to the bank’s governors, effective February 19, making her the seventh member of the bank’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC).

With 17 years of experience in public policy analysis and formulation, Tshazibana has worked at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the National Treasury, and the National Energy Regulator of South Africa.

She is currently the alternate executive director on the IMF executive board, which runs the fund’s day-to-day operations. The board’s responsibilities include the review and approval of Article IV reports for 189 member countries.

As the alternate executive director for the IMF, Tshazibana represented South Africa and 22 other countries in sub-Saharan Africa within the Africa Group 1 Constituency Office, where she led the analysis of the external and financial sector, including the management of capital flows.

Before joining the IMF, Tshazibana was Treasury’s economic policy and forecasting division head and deputy director-general, responsible for compiling the economic outlook that informed the budget preparations.

She led work in a range of areas, including an analysis of the impact of the pricing and market structure of the electricity, transport, and telecommunications sectors on the cost structure of the economy.

Tshazibana has also represented National Treasury in government’s Economic Cluster, served on National Treasury’s Fiscal Liability Committee, and co-chaired its Macroeconomic Standing Committee (MSC).

The MSC is a joint committee of National Treasury and Sarb representatives which provides policy advice to the Minister of Finance and the Reserve Bank Governor on key macroeconomic concerns. It considers, among other things, the options to enhance the inflation-targeting framework, the composition and level of international reserves and the macroeconomic outlook.