2024 ECA Academy Award Ceremony and Presentation of Winning Research

The ECA Academy, organized annually by the Office of the Europe and Central Asia (ECA) Chief Economist, identifies the best new policy-relevant research from across the World Bank Group on topics of interest to the ECA region. This year, three winning papers were selected with significant policy implications for the region on environmental sustainability, public health, and state-owned enterprises.

During this session we will award the winning authors and discuss one of the winning papers "The Financial Premium and Real Cost of Bureaucrats in Businesses". This paper characterizes credit allocation distortions in capital markets across state and private-owned enterprises, by implementing Whited and Zhao (2021)'s methodology on a novel firm-level database from 2010-2016. It reveals that state-owned enterprises (SOEs) get subsidized access to debt and equity compared to private firms in the same country and narrow industry but cautions that eliminating SOEs could harm overall productivity due to their technical efficiency. However, targeted reforms that only shut down poor performing SOEs could boost total factor productivity by up to 15% in every country studied.

• Antonella Bassani - Opening Remarks

  Vice President for Europe and Central Asia, the World Bank

  Antonella Bassani is Vice President of the Europe and Central Asia Region at the World Bank. In this position, Antonella leads the World Bank's strategic, financing and knowledge work for this region. Antonella has held several senior leadership positions in the World Bank, including most recently as Vice President for Budget, Performance Review and Strategic Planning. Prior to that she was responsible for overseeing operations in two regions as Director for Strategy and Operations (East Asia and Pacific, Middle East and North Africa), providing leadership and support to regional teams in the delivery of high-quality strategies and operations, flexible and innovative financing, and knowledge services.

  Antonella Bassani - Opening Remarks
• Ana Paula Cusolito - Speaker

  Senior Economist at the Office of the Chief Economist for Europe and Central Asia, the World Bank

  Ana Paula Cusolito is a Senior Economist currently working in the Office of the Chief Economist for Europe and Central Asia of the World Bank. Her research focuses on firm and aggregate productivity and its determinants, including foreign competition, digital-technology adoption, innovation, and corporate governance. Ana Paula has co-authored several academic papers, WBG flagship reports, and books. Her research has been published in international journals such as American Economic Review: Insights, Review of Economics and Statistics, Journal of Development Economics, World Bank Economic Review among others.

• Roberto N. Fattal Jaef - Speaker

  Senior Economist at the Development Research Group, World Bank

  Roberto N. Fattal Jaef is a Senior Economist in the Macroeconomics and Growth team of the World Bank's Research Department. His research interests cover various areas of macroeconomics, with a special emphasis on economic growth. Current and recent research topics include: 1) understanding the role of market distortions for firm level behavior, entrepreneurship, and long run macroeconomic outcomes; 2) investigating the micro and macro patterns of transition growth paths, 3) studying the role of credit for the business cycle. Prior to joining the Bank, he worked at the International Monetary Fund's Research department (2011-2013). He holds a Ph.D. in Economics from UCLA.

  Roberto N. Fattal Jaef - Speaker
• Fausto Patiño Peña - Speaker

  Economist in the Macroeconomics, Trade, and Investment Global Practice at the World Bank

  Fausto Patiño Peña is an Economist at the World Bank's Macroeconomics, Trade, and Investment Global Practice for the Latin America region. His expertise covers topics such as aggregate productivity and misallocation, growth, firm and labor demand dynamics, state-owned enterprises, firm technology and innovation, and jobs and informality. Fausto has authored research papers and contributed to Flagship reports in these fields at a research capacity and within the World Bank. He has also participated in development policy and investment loan engagements in various countries in Latin America focused in the areas of growth, productivity, innovation, and trade promotion.

  Fausto Patiño Peña - Speaker
• Akshat Singh - Speaker

  Economist at the Asia and Pacific Department, International Monetary Fund (IMF)

  Akshat recently joined the International Monetary Fund as an Economist in the Economist Program. Before joining the IMF, he completed his graduate studies at the University of Oxford. He is interested in studying firm-level characteristics that determine access to finance and their relevance for the effectiveness of macroeconomic policy.

• Romain Alexandre Duval - Discussant

  Assistant Director in the European Department, International Monetary Fund (IMF)

  Romain Duval is an Assistant Director in the European Department, where he is the IMF Mission Chief for Spain and leads the Department's agenda on growth, labor, climate and energy issues, after having led the Regional Economic Outlook for Europe and the Emerging Economies Unit. Previously, he was an Assistant Director in the IMF Research Department, where he led the agenda on structural reforms and, prior to that, was the Division Chief for Regional Studies of the Asia Pacific Department, where he was the editor of the Regional Economic Outlook for the region and in charge of the research on regional issues. Before joining the Fund, he was the Division Chief for Structural Surveillance at the OECD Economics Department, where he was the editor of the OECD flagship publication Going for Growth and in this role also carried out and supervised policy and research projects.

  Romain Alexandre Duval - Discussant
• Ivailo Izvorski - Host & Chair

  Chief Economist for Europe and Central Asia at the World Bank

  Ivailo Izvorski is the Chief Economist for Europe and Central Asia. He assumed this position on December 1, 2022. After joining the World Bank in 2005 as a Senior Country Economist in the Poverty Reduction and Economic Management Sector Unit working on Bosnia and Herzegovina, he has since held various positions -including Lead Economist and Practice Manager in Europe and Central Asia, and his most recent assignment as Practice Manager for the Global Macro and Debt Analytics in the Macroeconomics, Trade and Investment (MTI) Global Practice. Ivailo is one of the coauthors of Diversified Development: Making the Most of Natural Resources in Eurasia. He has worked on countries in Europe, Central Asia, East Asia and the Pacific, and Africa at the World Bank, the Institute of International Finance, and the IMF. Ivailo holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Yale University.

  Ivailo Izvorski - Host & Chair