Institute for Economic Research and Policy Consulting

History

The Institute for Economic Research and Policy Consulting was founded in October 1999 by top-ranking Ukrainian politicians and the German Advisory Group on Economic Reforms in Ukraine, the latter being a part of Germany's. TRANSFORM programme.

1999-2004:

This was the period of organizing and establishing the Institute as a research institution of a new type for Ukraine. During this period the Institute’s main tasks were providing public authorities and politicians with impartial analysis of the Ukrainian economy and economic policies along with developing analytical capacity of Ukrainian researchers and creating a resource base for conducting researches and consulting. The German Advisory Group on Economic Reforms played a special role at that stage.

2005-2006:

This was the period of strength and stability tests for the Institute. The German technical assistance programme TRANSFORM ended. We faced the challenge of searching for our place in the market of advisory services. Main objective in that period was to find our own niche in the market of advisory services and new stable sources of financing, without losing our essential skills and preserving the principle of impartiality in our work. At this time we offered the society a new instrument of control and influence on the government – monitoring of government’s decisions carried out by a consortium of independent analytical centres.

2007- until now:

This is the phase of the Institute’s active development and strengthening its role as an independent policy think tank. The main goal of this period was and remains  acquisition of new knowledge and skills for further improving our work and extending the area of expertise. We launched research activities in new areas and mastered new methods of research, learnt to disseminate information in a more efficient way, acquired experience in implementing projects in the area of economic policy responding not only to the question “what to do” but also to “how to organize fulfilling of tasks”. A systemic work with business community had been initiated – we offered to business partners a package containing economic information, analysis of situations and forecasts which are necessary for planning and conducting activities.

Mission, targets, principle

Institute's mission is to provide an alternative position on key problems of social and economic development of Ukraine.

The key tasks associated with the implementation of our mission at the current stage are:

In its work the Institute is guided by the principles of free and democratic markets in an open society. The key precondition for the IER activity is its political independence that ensures impartiality in the IER recommendations on economic policy problems and helps avoiding manipulation with the research results.

Institute Structure

The IER includes three research Centres interconnected by the mutual goal — studying the problems and prospects of Ukraine’s economic development in the context of societal, social and state modernization:

Center for Economic Studies that continues traditions of economic research, forecasting and modelling, as well as consulting on economic and social policymaking.

Center for Contemporary Society Studiesthat accumulates all projects related to the assessment of expectations and other data directly received from enterprises and citizens, as well as to research based on application of sociological data gathering methods.

Center for International Studies, which continues the research of Ukraine’s role in the world division of labour in context of international relations, namely its relations with neighbours and the main international centres of power, as well as Ukraine’s politics of European integration.

Experience

The Institute has experience in shaping of national economic policies and strategies. It is engaged in research in the field of economics, and interdisciplinary research in the tangent to the economic policy areas and provides international expertise. Institute experts participate in international economic discussion on the most current issues.

Institutional partners

German Advisory Group on Economic Reforms in Ukraine

German Advisory Group on Economic Reforms in Ukraine has been conducting its activities in Ukraine since November 1994 commissioned by the German Federal Government. Since establishment the Group’s experts have provided advisory services for the Ukrainian Government, the Verkhovna Rada, the President’s Secretariat and the National Bank of Ukraine on conducting economic reforms. The Group has worked in a close cooperation with the Institute for Economic Research and Policy Consulting.

German-Ukrainian Policy Dialogue in Agriculture

Since January 2006 this project has been providing assistance to Ukrainian politicians and lawmakers on reforming agrarian policy and legislation with the account of German and other countries’ practices as well as those of international organizations (EU, WTO) on the basis of market economy principles. Main topics are: trade in agricultural and food products; bioenergy; land markets; consumers’ rights protection; agricultural and food products value chains. Beneficiaries: Ministry of Agricultural Policy, other sectoral ministries, Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, President’s Secretariat, Verkhovna Rada, associations of agricultural producers, mass media and journalists’ associations. The project is implemented with the support of the German Federal Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection.

Swiss Economic Institute KOF (Project "Business Survey")

Since September 2005 the Institute has been receiving technical assistance from the Swiss Economic Institute (KOF), which operates under the auspices of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH), Zurich. In the framework of the programme of scientific cooperation between Eastern Europe and Switzerland SCOPE 2005  - 2008 and SCOPE 2009  - 2012, which is financed by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF), Swiss Development and Cooperation Agency implements a project of institutional partnership between Swiss and Ukrainian institutes. The project’s objective is developing surveys of business tendencies, increasing the number of internationally recognized indexes calculated by surveys’ results, developing methodological instruments for conducting conjuncture surveys in Ukraine.