Selected Presentations & Appearances
Karina Fernandez-Stark was invited to the U.S. Alliance for Development in Democracy (ADD) Consultative Dialogue on Supply Chains and Economic Growth. During her presentation, Karina highlighted that ADD countries can be positioned as fully integrated regional suppliers of medical devices, with strong capabilities in the distribution of products in the broader life sciences sector. Further, she provided upgrading strategies and recommendations in the healthcare and medical devices sectors.
During this event, the United States, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, and Panama signed a memorandum of understanding to advance the U.S.-ADD Consultative Dialogue on Supply Chains and Economic Growth. Under the memorandum, participant countries will work together to strengthen supply chain resiliency, with a view to sharing best practices and results with the entire region. Leaders also met with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to finalize the development of the U.S. Chamber Survey on Supply Chain Resiliency, which will identify key opportunities, challenges, and areas for collaboration. The meeting in Washington, D.C. builds on momentum from the Summit of the Americas and will deepen economic cooperation and help generate economic growth in the region.
Karina Fernandez-Stark participated in the virtual launch of the book "Gender Gaps in Global Value Chains in Latin America and the Caribbean: New and Old Challenges in a Scenario of Uncertainty," co-edited by herself, Nicole Bidegain Ponte, Nanno Mulder, and Winfried Weck. The book is a joint effort by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) and the Konrad Adenauer Foundation (KAS), and it sheds light on gender disparities within global value chains (GVCs) in the region. The conference was led by the Executive Secretary of ECLAC, José Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs.
GVC integration and upgrading have been pivotal goals for trade and foreign direct investment policies in developing countries. While sectors like apparel and agriculture have provided significant female employment opportunities and wage-based work, there has been limited research on the quality of such employment and whether men and women are benefiting equitably. In the book, Karina Fernandez-Stark introduces a gendered GVC framework to address these gaps comprehensively. It goes beyond solely analyzing women's experiences over time and focuses on comparing men's and women's access to the same work under similar conditions. The framework assesses the GVC gender participation gap, unraveling gendered job distributions at various levels of the value chain, and examines the gender gaps in work conditions, including compensation, job stability, and formality.
The application of this methodology in Latin America and the Caribbean reveals that women typically encounter less advantageous opportunities in GVCs compared to men. They are concentrated in low value-added industries and segments, limiting their chances for growth and advancement. Moreover, persistent gender wage gaps, higher job insecurity, and informal employment for women underscore the need for understanding and addressing these disparities.
By participating in the book's launch, Karina Fernandez-Stark highlights the importance of this research in advancing the understanding of gender dynamics within GVCs and calls for comprehensive policies and strategies to promote gender equality in the region.
Karina highlighted that ADD countries have demonstrated expertise in healthcare GVCs, particularly in the field of medical devices, and that the industry offers significant opportunities. To drive a joint GVC strategy, she stressed the necessity of implementing several policies and programs, including regional coordination protocols, collaborative human resource development and certification programs, enhanced logistics and shipping, and coordinated investment and trade promotion initiatives. Karina concluded that the joint strategy should be built on complementarity rather than intra-regional competition.
In 2021, IDB INTAL and the Interdisciplinary Institute of Political Economy (IIEP UBA-CONICET) launched a call for research papers to generate diagnoses and specific intervention proposals on different aspects related to the production and export of Knowledge-Based Services in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). As a result of the call for papers, the winning papers were published in Integración & Comercio Magazine No. 48.
Within this framework, this event seeks to generate a dialogue between the authors of the magazine and various relevant actors from the public and private sectors of the region on the potential of KBS in the region.
Designed, developed and delivered a global value chains and industrial policy training focused on services for the Chilean Government. The workshop was targeted to government officials, academia and private sector. The workshop was funded by the InterAmerican Development Bank.
At the Sixth Summit of the ADD, Karina joined esteemed authorities, including Manuel Tovar Rivera (Minister of Foreign Trade, Costa Rica), Julio José Prado (Minister of Production, Foreign Trade, Investment, and Fishing, Ecuador), Federico Alfaro Boyd (Minister of Commerce and Industry, Panama), and Víctor Bisonó Haza (Minister of Industry, Trade, and SMEs, Dominican Republic). Karina was also invited to the ADD - USA Business Council conference. The event served as a platform for policymakers and industry leaders to discuss strategies for driving economic growth.
Karina Fernandez-Stark presented the role of North America in Global Value Chains, discussing the challenges the region faces in maintaining its leadership in global industries at the launch of "North America 2.0: Towards a Continental Future" published by The Wilson Center and the Canada Institute. North America 2.0 is a compilation of perspectives on the future of the trilateral relationship. This event consisted of two panel discussions with the authors and contributors to the book, as well as comparing experts' perspectives on the opportunities for collaboration within North America and the challenges faced by the three countries, ahead of the next North American Leaders' Summit.
Designed, developed and delivered a global value chains and industrial policy training for the Pacific Alliance GVC group. The workshop was funded by the InterAmerican Development Bank.
Designed, developed and delivered a global value chains and industrial policy training focused on services for the Ministry of Commerce. The workshop was targeted to government officials, academia and private sector. The workshop was funded by the InterAmerican Development Bank.
Designed, developed and delivered a global value chains and industrial policy training focused on services for the Dominican Republic Ministry of Commerce. The workshop was targeted to government officials, academia and private sector. The workshop was funded by the InterAmerican Development Bank.
Designed, developed and delivered a global value chains and industrial policy training focused on services for the Chilean Government. The workshop was targeted to government officials, academia and private sector. The workshop was funded by the Undersecretary for International Economic Relations of Chile.
Designed, developed and delivered a four-day workshop on global value chains and industrial policy funded by the Organization of American States. The workshop was targeted to Belize government officials, academia and private sector.
Designed, developed and delivered a four-day workshop on global value chains and industrial policy funded by the Organization of American States. The workshop was targeted to Jamaica government officials, academia and private sector.
Designed, developed and delivered a four-day workshop on global value chains and industrial policy funded by the Organization of American States. The workshop was targeted to St. Lucia government officials, academia and private sector.
Designed, developed and delivered a five-day workshop on global value chains and industrial policy funded by the Organization of American States. The workshop was targeted to Barbados government officials, academia and private sector.
Designed and delivered two half-day training workshop for members of the Department of Trade and Industry in the Philippines. The goal of the program was to strengthen participants understanding of the global value chain framework as a tool for industrial policy development.
Designed, developed and delivered a series of workshops and webinars to NAC researchers that are focusing on using the GVC methodology on their tasks. This capacity building project is a three-year engagement.
Designed, developed and delivered a five-day workshop on global value chains and industrial policy funded by the World Bank. The workshop was targeted to KIDI (National Development Research Institute under the Ministry of Industry and New Technology) officials.
Designed, developed and delivered a five-day workshop on global value chains and industrial policy funded by the Inter-American Development Bank targeting representatives from the Ministry of Industry, Energy and Mining; Ministry of Livestock, Agriculture and Fisheries; National Agency for Research and Innovation; the Office of Financial Planning and Uruguay XXI.
Designed, developed and delivered a two-day workshop on the use of global value chain analysis for improving sustainable development outcomes of both sovereign and non-sovereign operations at the African Development Bank. Tunis, Tunisia. January 2014.
Designed, developed and delivered a five-day capacity-building workshop funded by the Inter-American Development Bank to teach participants how to use the value chain framework to analyze the dynamic nature of world trade and the evolution of exports over time, and assess key constraints to competitiveness for firms in their respective countries. Participants were drawn from both the public and private sector in 8 Caribbean countries, including Barbados, Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago.
Designed, developed and delivered a GVC manual in Spanish for Latin American academics and researchers. “Desarrollo Económico Local y Cadenas Globales de Valor.”