Acknowledgment

We would like to acknowledge the contribution of Jackie Chin, Portfolio Manager, Investment Strategy at Victorian Funds Management Corporation, BEcon (Hons) 2005, in the development of this assignment.

Why do we need to do this assignment?

Two important skills that professional economists require to excel in the workplace are (i) the ability to use and handle data; (ii) the ability to communicate their findings concisely and precisely. This includes knowing how to

• find and extract good quality and relevant data;
• organise the data in ways that provide useful information;
• interpret the information to answer the questions in hand; and
• present your findings.

This assignment aims to provide you an opportunity to develop these skills.

Task Background

A multinational company is considering to make an investment in the country that you have been allocated. If the macroeconomic environment of the country is deemed favourable, then the company will proceed to look for specific investment projects. However, you are not provided any information regarding potential investment projects for commercial confidentiality reasons.

As independent an economic consultant, you are hired by this company to provide an economic profile for the country and make a recommendation to your client.

Task

Your deliverable is a structured country economic profile report (see the Report Structure section below).

Your report should cover the period from year X to the most recent years for which data are available. You need to decide what year X is. The minimum number of years is five. Make sure that you can find data for this period.

You can use up to 3 graphs or tables in total for the report; you can use a mixture of graphs and tables as long as the total number is no more than 3. You can include more than one variable in a graph or table. You must produce your own graphs or tables rather than cut and paste from other sources.

Q: Why can’t I use more than 3 graphs or tables

A: Consultant reports are typically very concise so that (busy) readers can focus just on the most important information.

Q: Why do I have to produce my own graphs or tables rather than just cut and paste from other sources?

A: This is part of the training on how to extra and organise data and present findings.

The report must be submitted through Turnitin on Blackboard for plagiarism check.

Q: Where can I find the marking guide?

A: The marking guide (Rubric) is on Blackboard > Assessment > Country Report (full report)

Q: Can we do it as a group assignment?

A: No. This is an individual assignment. UQ has strict rules against cheating, including “colluding with other students on individual assessment items” as a form of cheating. You must read and be familiar with these rules (PPL 3.60.04 Student Integrity and Misconduct).

Country Allocation

The country you are allocated is based on the last digit of your student number:

Last digit	Country
0	Austria
1	Canada
2	France
3	Germany
4	Ireland
5	Italy
6	Japan
7	Poland
8	Spain
9	Switzerland

For example, if your student number is 44194356, then you need to work on country number 6 – Japan. Be aware that the number in your student email address (e.g. S4419435) is not your student number: it misses the last digit (i.e. 6 in this example)!

However, if your allocated country based on your student number is the one in which you were born or resided predominantly in the past 10 years, you must inform the course coordinator and you will be allocated a different country.

A penalty of up to 5 percentage points (out of 25%) will incur if students do not follow the allocation rules.

Data

Your primary data sources should be:

• National agencies, g. Statistical Bureau, Treasury, Central Bank; or
• Multinational agencies, e.g. the World Bank, the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank, the Bank for International

Data from secondary sources can still be used as a supplement only if those data are not available from any primary sources. Using non-primary data could lead to mark losses when primary source data is available for your country. The World Bank’s World Development Indicators (WDI) database contains most of the national data collected by national and multinational agencies and can be used as a primary data source.

The course’s edX-Edge platform provides guidelines on how to extra data from the WDI and how to analyse and present data using Excel: Course > Getting Started with ECON1020 > Assessment: How to... > How to: Use the World Development Indicators (WDI) Database

Report Structure and Format

You must use the report template on Blackboard > Assessment > Country Report > Report Template.

Font type: Arial Font size: 12

Line space: 1.5

Cover Sheet

You must include the cover sheet in full (in the template) in your submission for drafts and full reports. A penalty of up to 1 percentage point for a draft and 4 percentage points for the full report will be applied if failing to do so.

1.            Executive summary (~120 words)  

2. Macroeconomic performance (~600 words)
   1. Assess the macroeconomic performance of your country based on macroeconomic indicators, g. GDP per capita, inflation, unemployment etc.
   2. Explain how the indicators in (a) are related to each other in the context of your country.
   3. What factors, including economic policies, are driving the indicators in (a)? Are these factors likely to continue or change in the near future?

3.            Benchmarking (~300 words)

1. Which country or group of countries could be used as a benchmark to measure the country’s economic performance. Why did you select this country or group of countries as the benchmark?
2. How does your country’s performance compare to the benchmark?

4.            Beyond macroeconomics (~250 words)

1. Describe one social, political, or environmental issue of the country that is significantly affected by the recent development of its macroeconomy, or vice versa or

5.            Recommendation (~120 words)

1. Will you recommend your country as an investment destination for your client based on its macroeconomic outlook?
2. Justify your
3. Discuss any limitations in your

6.    Reference

References and citations must be in Harvard style.