On February 12, 2014, ISET hosted the Italian Ambassador to Georgia, H.E. Federica Favi. The Ambassador gave a presentation about the historical challenges and choices that Italy faced following World War II.

The growth forecast for the 4th quarter of 2013 is unchanged at 4.9%, suggesting annual growth of 2.6%, while Geostat’s flash estimates are 6.9% for 2013Q4 and 3.1% for the whole year.

Over the winter holidays, I had the leisure to read the book “Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty” by MIT economist Daron Acemoglu and Harvard political scientist James A. Robinson (Crown Business 2012, 544 pages, Hardcover $20.00). Both authors are very eminent – one would not be surprised if Acemoglu, a Turkish-born Armenian and the most frequently cited contemporary economist, would receive the Nobel Prize in economics somewhere down the road.

On 3-7 February 2014 a group of ISET-PI researchers was trained in Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA). The main goal of implementing RIA is to ensure that the benefits of a regulation exceed its costs for society as a whole.

In recent months, ISET‐PI has devoted considerable time to explore the reasons behind the sharp decline in annual real GDP growth in 2013 (from 6.2% in 2012 to 3.3%). With official data for the whole of 2013 finally becoming available, we are taking this opportunity to revisit our previous conclusions and offer new insights.