On the morning of May 26, 2026, the inauguration ceremony of the BNUBS Overseas Expert Forum  Lecture Series and the visiting professor appointment ceremony were successfully held in Conference Room 1722 of the Rear Main Building. Professor Sabina Alkire, Director of the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI) at the University of Oxford, was appointed Visiting Professor of Beijing Normal University Business School (BNUBS) and delivered the keynote speech for the event. Over thirty teachers and students of the School attended the simple yet solemn ceremony and academic lecture.

At the start of the activity, BNUBS officially conferred the visiting professor appointment upon Professor Sabina Alkire. On behalf of the School, Professor Qi Yudong, Dean of BNUBS, presented the appointment letter and extended a warm welcome to Professor Alkire. In his speech, Dean Qi pointed out that Professor Alkire is a top-tier global scholar in the field of multidimensional poverty measurement. Her appointment will effectively boost BNUBS’s disciplinary development and international academic cooperation in poverty research, development economics, labor economics and other relevant fields.

Thereafter, Professor Xu Minbo, Director of the Department of Economics, presided over the lecture and introduced Professor Alkire’s academic background and outstanding achievements to the teachers and students present. Holding a PhD in Economics from the University of Oxford, Professor Alkire has taught at George Washington University and Harvard University and worked at the World Bank. She co-founded the Alkire-Foster (AF) multidimensional poverty measurement methodology with Professor James Foster, which has become the global standard approach for multidimensional poverty measurement. Since 2010, she has led her team in compiling the Global Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) for the United Nations Development Programme. Incorporated into the monitoring system of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, the index has been adopted by more than 100 countries worldwide.

Following the introduction, Professor Alkire delivered a keynote lecture themed National Multidimensional Poverty Index and Its Policy Applications Across the Globe.

She stated that the core value of the Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) lies in its capability to accurately identify poverty, optimize policy formulation and evaluate poverty reduction effects. The MPI can effectively locate regions and groups with severe poverty, provide targeted intervention targets for governments, and feature prominent flexibility in localized adaptation. For instance, in Panama, the MPI exposed prominent infrastructure and educational deficiencies in indigenous areas, prompting the government to prioritize resource allocation to these regions. In Sri Lanka, the MPI revealed that tea farmers suffered from low living standards despite decent income levels, enabling the government to launch targeted improvement programs. Meanwhile, Professor Alkire objectively analyzed the challenges confronting MPI application, including insufficient indicator adaptation, uneven data quality and inadequate cross-departmental coordination. In response to these problems, she put forward optimization suggestions covering localized indicator adjustment, enhanced data development, integrated policy implementation and in-depth international cooperation.

During the interactive session, teachers and students actively raised questions concerning poverty measurement methods, the localized application of MPI in China, and data accessibility. Professor Alkire provided detailed responses to each question based on global practical cases and her own research experience, creating a strong academic atmosphere on site.

This lecture not only built a high-level international academic exchange platform for BNUBS faculty and students, but also deepened their understanding of global multidimensional poverty measurement and its policy applications, offering valuable insights for academic research and talent cultivation in relevant fields. Meanwhile, Professor Alkire’s appointment as a visiting professor will further advance BNUBS’s disciplinary construction in labor economics, development economics, income distribution and poverty governance, facilitate the normalization of high-level international cooperation, and inject new academic momentum into the school’s efforts to serve the national strategy of common prosperity.

Expert Profile

Professor Sabina Alkire currently serves as Director of the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI) at the University of Oxford and holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Oxford. She has previously held teaching positions at George Washington University and Harvard University and worked at the World Bank. She co-developed the classic Alkire-Foster (AF) multidimensional poverty measurement methodology, which has become the universal standard for global multidimensional poverty assessment. Since 2010, she has led the compilation of the UNDP Global Multidimensional Poverty Index, which has been integrated into the UN Sustainable Development Goal monitoring system and adopted by over 100 countries worldwide. Furthermore, Professor Alkire was elected Fellow of the British Academy in 2021, listed in Forbes Top 100 Global Thinkers in 2010, and awarded the Gold Medal of Honor of Bhutan in 2025. She also serves as an expert member of the United Nations Committee for Development Policy.

Edited by Xu Minbo, Shen Yangyang

Reviewed by Hu Conghui