About us

The Baltic International Centre for Economic Policy Studies (BICEPS) is an independent research centre established in 2001 with the help of a grant from the Swedish Foreign Ministry and with assistance from the Stockholm Institute of Transition Economics (SITE). BICEPS is located in the building of the Stockholm School of Economics in Riga in the centre of Riga:

Strelnieku iela 4a
Riga LV-1010, Latvia
Tel: +371 67015870
e-mail: marija[at]biceps.org

Our aim is to undertake and promote high quality policy-oriented research in economics and other social sciences and to provide informed advice and consulting services for both government and business in the Baltic states and elsewhere. We have a dedicated and international team of researchers with research experience in a wide range of fields. Our activities include academic research, commissioned work for local ministries and international institutions as well as participation in EU-wide networks.

In its first two to three years BICEPS benefited from funding provided by the Swedish Foreign Ministry which was administered by the Stockholm Institute for Transition Economics (SITE) but from the beginning we actively sought other sources of funding – in particular research projects. Since then BICEPS has been fully self-financed from projects and commissions with revenue growing steadily every year.

Since its foundation BICEPS has an especially close collaboration with the Stockholm School of Economics in Riga (SSE Riga). We run a joint academic seminar that meets bi-weekly featuring local as well as visiting speakers. Also, together with SSE Riga we publish Baltic Journal of Economics (BJE), the Research Papers Series, and the annual Global Entrepreneurship Monitor Latvia Report.

BICEPS is part of the FREE Network – The Forum for Research on Eastern Europe and Emerging Economies. FREE Network is a joint initiative by SITE (Stockholm), BEROC (Minsk), BICEPS (Riga), CEFIR at NES (Moscow), CenEA (Szczecin), ISET-PI (Tbilisi) and KSE Institute (Kiev). Together, these research institutes form an extensive network of leading academic experts on economic issues in Central and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. The institutes also conduct research about development, emerging markets, as well as economics in general.

The FREE Policy Brief Series is designed to provide short and informative analyses on current economic policy challenges in Eastern Europe and emerging markets. The writings are based on academic research papers or policy work by the researchers at the different institutes and updated on a weekly basis. The ambition is to bridge the gap between ongoing academic research and policy making, to stimulate and contribute to the international debate as well as to intensify the interaction and discussion with other researchers, policy-makers, and business representatives across the world.

In 2019 the FREE Network, with the support of the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) initiated the Forum for Research on Gender Economics (FROGEE). The aim of FROGEE is to contribute to the discussion on gender inequality, with a specific focus on the region of Central and Eastern Europe. By highlighting different dimensions of gender inequality and its consequences for socio-economic development, FROGEE aims at bringing the issue of gender equality to the focus of both general public and policy makers. These objectives are addressed through publication of reviews and policy briefs, organization of conferences, seminars, and workshops, as well as further development of research collaboration on gender economics with other institutions. SIDA provides financial support to FROGEE.