LIMS participated in Atlas Network’s annual Liberty Forum and Freedom Dinner in New York City, held on November 20-21, 2024. This prestigious gathering brought together activists and leaders from around the world to exchange insights and strategies for advancing market reforms globally.

At the Freedom Dinner, LIMS was honored with the 2024 Templeton Freedom Award for its successful “Subsidy Free Lebanon” project. This initiative played a pivotal role in terminating the Central Bank’s costly subsidy program, which had driven unsustainable fiscal deficits, distorted markets, and created severe shortages of essential goods such as fuel, medicine, and food. By eliminating subsidy programs and price controls, the project enabled the return of over 300 food items, fuel, infant formula, and medications to store shelves. LIMS also achieved a critical policy milestone in 2023 by averting another Central Bank bailout. Without central bank funding, Lebanon’s parliament was compelled to adopt a zero-deficit budget—the country’s first in decades—by January 2024.

The recognition underscores LIMS’s ability to deliver market oriented economic reform and fiscal responsibility, in the complicated political, social and security environment of Lebanon.