During the XVIII Biennial Conference of the European Association of Comparative Economics (EACES) in Belgrade, two senior members of ISET faculty, Norberto Pignatti and Karine Torosyan, have been elected President and Secretary of the Association, respectively, for the 2024-2026 term. ISET congratulates them on this professional achievement and wishes them continued success in both EACES and their work at ISET.

EACES was founded in Verona, Italy, in September 1990 during an international conference attended by 160 economists from 24 countries, all conducting research in Comparative Economics. The Association was established to promote research and scientific exchanges in this field. Today, EACES has grown to over 400 members, including nine institutional members.

From October 3 to 5, ISET Policy Institute and Leibniz Institute of Agricultural Development in Transition Economies (IAMO) hosted a three-day International Conference. The conference was jointly organized by ISET and IAMO and titled “Improving the Functioning of Agri-Food Value Chains in the South Caucasus Region”. The aim of the conference was to foster dialogue among academics, policymakers, practitioners, and civil society stakeholders and explore strategies for overcoming obstacles and enhancing the development of the agri-food sector in the region.

The conference featured a policy panel discussion titled, 'Resilient Agri-Food Value Chains: Counteracting Economic and Political Vulnerabilities in the South Caucasus Region.' The panel, moderated by Salome Gelashvili from the University of Göttingen, Germany, included insights from distinguished experts: Linde Götz from IAMO (Germany), Irakli Kasrashvili from Mercy Corps (Georgia), Bojan Kolundzija from Helvetas (Moldova), Namig Shalbuzov from ATM (Azerbaijan), Hrachya Zakoyan from ANAU (Armenia), and Andrea Zimmermann from FAO (Italy). The discussion focused on the challenges faced by agri-food value chain participants, particularly in light of recent crises.

In a significant moment for collaboration, ISET and IAMO officially signed a Memorandum of Understanding following the panel discussion. This partnership will open up new avenues for collaboration in research and the professional development of students and junior researchers, enhancing ongoing efforts to address the critical issues facing the agri-food sector in the South Caucasus.

October 19-20 witnessed the largest and most high-profile event of ISET’s year: the international conference on gender economics entitled ‘Gender Equality and Women’s Economic Empowerment in Time of Crisis’. The two-day event, hosted by ISET and the FREE Network (the Forum for Research on Eastern Europe and Emerging Economies), attracted academics from 15 countries, including Australia, India, the USA, the countries of the South Caucasus, Eastern and Western Europe.

The conference began with an opening address from Dr. Tamar Sulukhia, Director of ISET, who thanked ISET partners and the conference’s main sponsor, the Swedish government, for its support and commitment to the issues of women’s empowerment in Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus, Ms. Eva Atterlöv, Deputy Head of Development Cooperation, and Ms. Kaori Ishikawa, UN Women’s Country Representative to Georgia, also addressed the guests in attendance highlighting the importance of the topic.

The conference participants were addressed by two keynote speakers, Prof. Dr. Elizabeth Brainerd, Susan and Barton Winokur Professor of Economics and Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies, Brandeis University, and Prof. Dr. Maria Floro, Professor Emerita Economics, American University in Washington, DC. They both drew attention to gender inequality in the world, with working women still earning 36% less than men on average. The ISET Policy Institute presentation which followed complemented the points made by the two speakers. In particular, Davit Keshelava of the ISET Policy Institute’s research team presented ISET’s recently launched regional Gender Equality Index, a new policy product of the ISET Policy Institute, which monitors the progress on gender equality in the South Caucasus and beyond, and in this way contribute to evidence-based policymaking.

The conference also featured a high-profile Policy Panel moderated by Tamar Sulukhia of ISET Policy Institute and represented by Nino Okribelashvili, Vice-Rector for Research, Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University; Nino Chelidze, Women’s Initiative for Security and Equity (WISE), Program Director, Mercy Corps; Nani Bendeliani, Project Analyst, UN Women; and Nino Lortkipanidze, Women in Tech Ambassador for Georgia, Chief Innovation Officer, The Crossroads. The discussion focused on the regional challenges to gender equality in the South Caucasus as a whole and policy solutions to address these challenges.

Professor Asali has once again aided the field of economics by participating in the 55th Annual Conference of the Canadian Economics Association – this year’s conference was held online between 3-5 June, and hosted by the Simon Fraser University Economics Department. In his latest presentation, by using a general-to-specific approach of vector-autoregression estimation, Prof. Asali offered his cutting-edge research on Cooperative and Violent Cycles within geopolitical conflicts.

Prof. Asali received his Ph.D. in Economics from Columbia University back in 2008 and soon after joined ISET’s resident faculty. Muhammad moreover has extensive teaching experience from Columbia University, New York University, and Union College. His research and teaching interests include Labor Economics, Applied Microeconomics, Econometrics, and Time Series Econometrics.

Prof. Asali will soon also present his research on exchange rates and the labor market during the upcoming Armenian Economics Association meetings at the end of June. Watch out for our next update for more information!

Our latest news comes from ISET resident lecturer and researcher, Professor Muhammad Asali. Recently, Professor Asali joined a group of prominent economists from around the world and took part in the 140^th annual conference of the Western Economic Association International (WEAI). The conference platform is available here: WEAI online).

On the 19^th of March, Muhammad took the role of chair in a review and discussion on various facets of Uncertainty and Risk. He was joined by peers from the economics world, including the authors of related papers, from the University of Wisconsin, the University of Maryland, and Koç University in Istanbul.