February 27-28, 2003: Monetary Strategies for Accession Countries

at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences

(Budapest V., Roosevelt tér 9.)

Thursday, February 27

19.00 Diner (at the Magyar Magyar Nemzeti Bank, Budapest V., Szabadság tér 8-9.)

Speaker: Pedro Solbes, Member of the European Commission, Exchange_rate_policies_and_EMU_participation_of_accession_countries

Friday, February 28

9.00 Welcoming remarks by Zsigmond Járai, President, MNB

9.15 Welcoming_remarks by András Inotai,General Director, IWE

9.30 Key-note speech: Otmar Issing, Member of the Executive Board, ECB, “Considerations_on_Monetary_Policy_Strategies for Accession Countries”

Session I

Chair: Leszek Balcerowicz, Governor, National Bank of Poland

10.00-10.45 Speaker: Jürgen von Hagen, ZEI and Jizhong Zhou, ZEI, Exchange Rate Policies on the Last Stretch

Discussant: Vitor Gaspar, ECB

10.45-11.00 Coffee Break

11.00-11.45 Speaker: Luis Campos e Cunha, Nova University, Lisbon, Portugal and the EMU: 1996-2001, the Crucial Years:

Discussant: Paul De Grauwe, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven

Session II

Chair: Alexandre Lamfalussy

11.45-12.30 Speaker: Helmut Reisen, OECD, “Float in order to fix? Lessons from Emerging Markets for EU Accession Countries”

Discussant: Jürgen Stark, Bundesbank

12.30-14.15 Lunch

Speaker: Nicholas Garganas, Governor, Bank of Greece, Exchange_Rate_Regimes_on_the_Road_to_EMU:Lessons from Greece's Experience

Session III

Chair: Richard Portes, CEPR

14.15-15.00 Speaker: Gabriel Fagan, ECB, “Macroeconomic Adjustment to Structural Change”, by Gabriel Fagan, Vitor Gaspar and Alfredo Pereira

Chart A: Structure of the general equilibrum model

Discussant: Willem Buiter, EBRD

Session IV

Chair: Mitja Gaspari, Chairman, Bank of Slovenia

15.00-15.45 Speaker: Mihály A. Kovács, MNB, “How Real is the Fear? Investigating the Balassa-Samuelson Effect in the CEC5 Countries in the Prospect of EMU Enlargement”

Discussant: Jean-Philippe Cotis, OECD