HSE Nizhny Novgorod Hosts Fourth International Conference in Econometrics
From June 22 – 24, 2017, the 4th international conference in econometrics ‘Modern Econometric Tools and Applications’ took place at HSE in Nizhny Novgorod. Andrey Maximov, Professor, Head of theDepartment of Economic Theory and Econometrics and chair of the conference organizing committee, shared a brief overview of what the event achieved.
‘I’m glad that our region hosts this event. A community of ‘econometric people’ has been created, representing Russia’s econometric community. It’s rewarding to see that the people who came as visitors four years ago, are here today presenting their papers. The progress is obvious, and the programme committee members highlight this. While the primary aim of the first conference was to increase the quality of research with the use of econometric tools at HSE in Nizhny Novgorod, today the presentations given by participants are also of substantive interest for the expert community. This indicates that the quality of the presented research results is growing fast,’ says Andrey Maximov, Professor, Head of theDepartment of Economic Theory and Econometrics, HSE in Nizhny Novgorod
Andrey Maximov believes the conference’s two key purposes remain education and training:
‘That’s why the list of participants includes such renowned econometrists as Anatoly Peresetsky, Dean Fantazzini, Rustam Ibragimov, Irina Denisova, Evgenia Kolomak, Olga Demidova, Tatyana Ratnikova, and Andrey Aistov. You can always learn something from these people, and their papers make history. It is great that young researchers have the platform this conference provides to discuss both their research results and their problems. Understanding how the world of economics works helps solve specific issues, and to elaborate strategic development areas’.
Anatoly Peresetsky, Professor at the Department of Applied Economics, deputy editor-in-chief at the journal Applied Econometrics, head of the programme committee at the international conference in econometrics ‘Modern Econometric Tools and Applications’:
‘We used hold about 30 workshops on teaching econometrics in various Russian cities. And as a result, we published a textbook ‘Econometrics for beginners’ together with Jan Magnus and Pavel Katyshev, with a workbook. When we published this textbook in 1998, a lot of people told us that the word ‘econometrics’ in the title was too complicated. But since then, econometrics and related ideas have been developing rapidly in Russia, and today this book seems really quite simple compared with the other courses taught at universities today. Of course, the Higher School of Economics has played an important role in this progress, and not only its Moscow campus, but the Nizhny Novgorod one as well. The Nizhny Novgorod campus’s contribution can’t be overestimated, since it hosts what is essentially the only conference in Russia dedicated to applied econometrics.
Over the three years that I have followed this conference, the quality of presentations given by invited participants, as well as by the students and staff of the HSE campus in Nizhny Novgorod, has been improving. I’m very grateful to both the management and enthusiasts at the Nizhny Novgorod campus, particularly to Andrey Maximov and Svetlana Lapinova, who spend a lot of time and effort to make sure the conference is a success.’
Svetlana Bryzgalova, a graduate of HSE in Nizhny Novgorod, was one of the speakers at the conference. After receiving her PhD from the London School of Economics, since 2015 Svetlana has taught at Stanford Graduate School of Business. Speaking about the international conference at HSE in Nizhny Novgorod, Svetlana Bryzgalova said:
‘This is my third time at the econometrics conference in Nizhny Novgorod. Each year I see a broader range of research topics, and more and more people are developing interesting models to address important issues and applying the latest approaches to data analysis.
I would also like to highlight the student presentations: many were dedicated to relevant problems, and often analyzed original data collected by the authors.
Research today is so international and mobile that an academic school cannot evolve within just one university. Undoubtedly, it is not only the HSE campus in Nizhny Novgorod that is witnessing the development of various areas of economics and econometrics, but other campuses as well. And of course, I, as an HSE graduate, am happy to see this.’