Up to now there is only a German version but the English translation is already in preparation and will be available in a few days on our website. My experience tells me that central bankers and academics alike are willing to listen and to learn. The ability and willingness to comprehend is decisive for the success of this conference.
My most important task today is to award the CEPR/ESI prize for the best central bank research paper. Of the numerous papers submitted, Gert Peersman’s paper entitled “What caused the early millennium slowdown? Evidence based on vector autoregressions” was deemed to be the best. The paper attempts to answer this difficult question by academic means.