This Europe and Central Asia (ECA) Economic Update is a product of ECA’s Office of the Chief Economist led by Asli Demirgüç-Kunt, in collaboration with the Macroeconomics, Trade and Investment and the Poverty and Equity Global Practices.

In Part I, Chapter I was prepared in collaboration with the Prospects Group in the Equitable Growth, Finance and Institutions Vice Presidency. The team included Collette Mari Wheeler, Carlos Arteta, Michael Lokshin, Dana Lauren Vorisek, Damien Matthias Valentin Boucher, Justin Damien Guenette, Vasiliki Papagianni, Julia Renee Roseman Norfleet, Kaltrina Temaj, and Takefumi Yamazaki. Useful comments and inputs were provided by Anna Bjerde, Sandeep Mahajan, Mona Prasad, Tatiana Proskuryakova, Emilia Skrok, Gallina Andronova Vincelette, and Fabrizio Zarcone. Chapter I was closely coordinated with contributions from Part II authors. Chapter II was prepared by the ECA Chief Economist’s team jointly with the Development Impact Evaluation Group of Development Economics, in collaboration with the Governance Global Practice. The team was led by Michael Lokshin, Iván Torre, and Daniel Rogger and consisted of Teib Assaf, Zahid Hasnain, Vladimir Kolchin, Robert Lipinski, Patricia Rose Paskov, and Davide Zucchini. Box 2.2 was prepared by Manuel Maqueda and Daniel Li Chen from DIME DEC. Roby Senderowitsch and J. Daniel Boyce and their teams from the Governance Global Practice provided useful guidance and inputs throughout. Useful comments were provided by Lucio Monari and his team from the Infrastructure Global Practice, and by Robert Cull as the co-Director of the 2021 World Development Report on Data for Better Lives. Gallina Andronova Vincelette, Natalya Beisenova, R. Sudharshan Canagarajah, Stephen R.

Davenport, Cem Dener, Carl Patrick Hanlon, Auguste Kouame, Lalita Moorty, Constantin Rusu, Adam Shayne, Renaud Seligmann, and Linda Van Gelder provided helpful inputs. The team would like to thank Anna Bjerde, Xiaoqing Yu, and ECA regional leadership team for their guidance and inputs during the preparation of the report.

Part II was prepared by teams from the Macroeconomics, Trade and Investment Global Practice (led by Andrew Burns, Lalita M. Moorty, Sandeep Mahajan, and Jasmin Chakeri) and the Poverty and Equity Global Practice (led by Salman Zaidi). These teams included the following staff: Azamat Agaidarov, Enrique Blanco Armas, Reena Badiani-Magnusson, Javier Eduardo Baez Ramirez, Olena Bogdan, Tom Bundervoet, Benoit Philippe Marcel Campagne, Marie-Anne Chambonnier, Marcel Chistruga, Stefano Curto, Diana Victoria De Leon Dardon, Mariam Dolidze, Andrei Silviu Dospinescu, Bakyt Dubashov, Olga Emelyanova, Samuel Freije-Rodriguez, Alan Fuchs, Josip Funda, Anastasia Golovach, Maria Fernanda Gonzalez Icaza, Gohar Gyulumyan, Alexander Haider, Kiryl Haiduk, Sandra Hlivnjak, Saida Ismailakhunova, Ivailo Izvorski, Charl Jooste, Jonathan George Karver, Tehmina Shaukat Khan, Edith Kikoni, Milan Lakicevic, Chang Kee Lee, Leonardo Ramiro Lucchetti, Sanja Madzarevic-Sujster, Armineh Manookian Salmasi, Monika Anna Matyja, Appolenia Mbowe, Kristina Cathrine Mercado, Rose Mungai, Besart Myderrizi, Vinayakraj Nagaraj, Evgenij Najdov, Arvind Nair, Metin Nebiler, Trang Van Nguyen, Nga Thi Viet Nguyen, David Night, Desislava Enikova Nikolova, Chiyu Niu, Natsuko Kiso Nozaki, Ana Maria Oviedo, Catalin Pauna, Alisher Rajabov, Sjamsu Rahardja, Nadir Ramazanov, Besa Rizvanolli, Natasha Rovo, Apurva Sanghi, Cristina Savescu, Marc Tobias Schiffbauer, William Hutchins Seitz, Asli Senkal, Lazar Sestovic, Hilda Shijaku, Bojan Shimbov, Maryna Sidarenka, David Andrew Stephan, Thi Thanh Thanh Bui, Eskender Trushin, Michal Tulwin, Christoph Ungerer, Kristina Vaughan, and Bakhrom Ziyaev.

Sandra Gain and Barbara Karni provided the editorial support, and Michael Alwan typeset the report. Indira Chand, Paul Anthony Clare, Carl Patrick Hanlon, Artem Kolesnikov, John Mackedon, and Sona V. Panajyan provided communications and outreach support. Ekaterina Ushakova oversaw the layout and production of the report.