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Yarom Ariav (born June 15th, 1954) was the 24th Director-General of the Israeli Ministry of Finance (2007-2009).

Ariav served as an officer in the IDF between 1972-1977, and completed his military service as captain. Ariav holds a Bachelors degree in Economics and International Relations (Cum Laude, 1981), and a Masters degree in Economics (Cum Laude, 1984) both from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Between 1984-1985 Ariav worked as an economist at the Planning division of the Ministry of Energy. In 1985, he started to work at the Budget Department in the Ministry of Finance's, and was also an external lecturer at the Hebrew University. In 1989, Ariav was appointed Deputy Director of Budgets, a position he held for four years. There, he played a central role in carrying out major economic reforms in the Israeli economy, including the design of governmental policy to promote the High Tech Industry and the establishment of the "Yozma" fund that launched venture capital in Israel. In 1993 Ariav served as the representative of Israel Chemicals Ltd in South America (1993-1996) and then as VP Marketing at Rotem Company (1996-2000). In 2000, he led the merger between Dead Sea Works and Rotem Amfert and was appointed Senior Vice President of marketing for the subsidiary ICL Fertilizers. The merger included consolidation of the logistics and sales centers of ICL's marketing companies throughout the world. From 2002 to 2006, he headed ICL Fertilizers Europe, based in the Netherlands, where he managed the Potash Mines and the ICL Fertilizers Plant in the UK and the Continent. Here, Ariav led the merger of ICL's phosphate and potash companies in Europe. Following his appointment as Director-General of the Ministry of Finance in January 2007, Ariav returned to Israel. He served in this position for three years, under ministers Avraham Hirchson, Ehud Olmert (as Prime Minister and Minister of Finance), Roni Bar-On and Yuval Steinitz. He also served as the Budget Director at the time of the biennial budget approval for 2009-2010. During his term, Ariav piloted the government's economic policy during the global financial crisis of 2008-2009. He also headed an inter-ministerial team for the reform of the Mandatory Tenders Law, and was active in the planning and implementation of the "Ofek Hadash" reform in primary education. He also headed the Public Committee for the Development and Increasing Competition in the Israeli Capital Market ("the Ariav Committee"). Ariav worked to establish and realize goals to encourage employment and reduce poverty, and headed the Government’s committee to implement a socio-economic agenda to reduce social gaps. In 2010 he headed the Public Committee for the Examination of Pre-Academic Preparatory Courses. From 2010 to 2012 he served as a lecturer at the School of Public Policy at the Hebrew University.

Today, he is the Executive Chairman of Lavi Capital, an investment bank for infrastructure and innovation, Chairman of the Investment Committee of Amitim (one of Israel's largest pension funds), Member of the Board of Directors of major Israeli companies such as Alony Hetz (commercial real estate), Hadera Papers (manufacturing), and Sonol (energy). Yarom Ariav is also a board member of Van Leer Group Foundation and Van Leer Jerusalem Institute. He also serves (voluntarily) as the chairman of the Lod Development Fund. Ariav is married, and is a father of four. He lives in Mevasseret Zion, Israel.