A UC Davis law professor has been chosen to lead a $15 million project to assist Indonesia's efforts to recover from its current financial crisis and make long-term economic improvements. Gary S. Goodpaster and nine other economic, finance, and legal experts will be in Indonesia for a year or more, beginning in January, to advise government officials, conduct research and draft policy. The project, Partnership for Economic Growth, is a joint activity of Indonesia and the U.S. Agency for International Development. "Indonesia has had an extraordinary change of government," says Goodpaster, who led an economic law development project there in 1997. "Its people, while impoverished, now have more freedom and voice than at any time in the last three decades, and the country is open to great possibilities of economic, social, political and legal development. "It will be worthwhile and interesting work to support Indonesia's efforts," adds the professor, who is director of the international Master of Laws program at UC Davis. The project will support Indonesian economic policy reforms in international and domestic trade and competition law as well as complement the economic crisis management activities of Indonesia, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the Asia Development Bank. Also providing technical assistance to the project will be Checchi and Company Consulting of Washington, D.C., and Nathan Associates of Arlington, Va., with assistance from the Boston Institute for Developing Economies and Innovative Resource Partners of Larkspur, Calif. The team also will manage an annual grants program designed to forge partnerships between U.S. and Indonesian institutions and to strengthen policy formation and economic development in Indonesia.