Training Program

Mid- to senior-level officials involved in developing forecasts that are used in the design and implementation of macroeconomic policy.

Participants should have an advanced degree in economics or equivalent experience. They should also be comfortable using software for econometric applications such as EViews.

This course, presented by the IMF's Institute for Capacity Development, aims to strengthen participants' macroeconomic forecasting and modeling skills through the application of modern econometric techniques. Lectures are designed to include a discussion of underlying theory, live presentations of empirical analyses on a personal computer, and hands-on learning by participants in a computer lab. The course focuses on five aspects of empirical model building and forecasting:

• data and model properties, including stationarity, non-stationarity and cointegration;
• dynamic specification, including the use of error correction models;
• model evaluation and model design;
• forecast uncertainty, forecasting for policy, and policy analysis; and
• combination forecasts.

Participants apply the techniques to a case study country for which they estimate a model, evaluate it, and then use the model for forecasting.