The Research Centre International Economics (FIW) was launched in 2006 by the then Feder-al Ministry of Economics and Labor. The aim was to create a research platform on topics rele-vant to foreign trade. The aim was to create a research platform on topics relevant to foreign trade.

FIW aims to improve the framework conditions for theoretical and empirical economic research as well as economic policy advice in the field of international economics and to increase the visibility of all universities and non-university research institutions involved in the cooperation project in the international research community.

Further goals are the bundling of cross-institutional research strengths and the international positioning of FIW as a networking center for the social and economic challenges in the field of globalization and world trade.

Today, the “Forschungsschwerpunkt Internationale Wirtschaft” (FIW) is a showcase project for networking and cooperation between universities, applied research institutes, social partners, economic policy makers and the interested public. It is a cooperation of the Austrian Institute of Economic Research (WIFO), the Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies (wiiw) and the Vienna Centre for Economic and Social Research (WSR) on the one hand and the Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration, the Johannes Kepler University Linz, the Leopold-Franzens University Innsbruck and the University of Vienna on the other hand. FIW is supported by the Federal Ministries BMBFW and BMAW.

FIW’s activities include supporting young researchers by funding pre-doctoral positions and awards for young researchers, organizing an annual two-day research conference, and one-day workshops on foreign economic research topics. It also publishes policy briefs and studies and provides statistics and data in the area of international economics.