OREANDA-NEWS.  April 19, 2013. The independent Russian jury together with representatives of Columbia University selected Lily Agarkova, editor of the “Own Business” section of the newspaper Delovoy Peterburg, and Mary Solomatova, an economics correspondent for the newspaper St. Petersburg Vedomosti, as the competition winners.

They submitted the most outstanding works in the nomination categories Small Business as a Key Factor in the Social-Economic Stability of Russia and Economics and Finance Benefiting People, respectively.

“Once again, we were amazed at the variety of themes and subjects of financial journalism throughout Russia. It is apparent that today this is one of the most socially relevant and popular areas of the journalistic profession. Participants from almost all regions of the country submitted more than 200 works, and we are very grateful to all who took part in the competition. We hope that the training course at Columbia University will help the winners in the further improvement their professional skills for the benefit of Russian readers,” said Denis Denisov, Head of Public Affairs at Citi Russia.

The top prize is a trip to the United States to participate in an eight-day training course at the renowned School of Journalism at Columbia University in New York, where participants will undergo an intense training program, meeting with well-known journalists, economists and financial experts.

The competition is traditionally held in two stages. During the first, the Russian stage, the submitted works are evaluated by an independent jury consisting of experts in finance and economics. This year’s jury consisted of Yassen Zasursky, President of the Faculty of Journalism at Lomonosov Moscow State University; Sergei Guriev, Rector of the New Economic School; Svetlana Dementyeva, Head of the Finance Section of the newspaper Kommersant; Anatoly Gavrilenko, Chairman of the Expert Group on Financial Education of the Federal Financial Markets Service of Russia (FFMS); and Yuri Voronenkov, Executive Director of the Financial Press Club and Advisor to the Head of the Analytical Center of the Government of Russia.

“The chosen themes for the competition have a social orientation and this stems from Citi’s desire to contribute to the development of social stability. The task of improving financial literacy is extremely important for Russia. In turn, media play an educating role on issues concerning the financial education of our citizens, telling people about effective management of personal finances, how to save, accumulate and protect their capital,” said Sergey Guriev, Rector of the New Economic School.

“I am convinced that an open dialogue about the development of small business in the regions in the mass media is necessary for modern Russia in order to assess the scale of the problems and develop appropriate solutions. Role of the Citi Journalistic Excellence Award is very noticeable in this process, and it helps to ensure that the quality of this dialogue is gradually increased,” said Anatoly Gavrilenko, Chairman of the Expert Group of the Federal Financial Markets Service.

“I am very fortunate to win this training course in business journalism at Columbia University in the United States and this is a very worthy prize. I would challenge business and financial journalists in Russia to believe in themselves and make an effort to participate in competitions such as the Citi Journalistic Excellence Award,” said Lilia Agarkova, the editor of the "Own Business" section in the newspaper Delovoy Peterburg.

“I thank the organizers for this opportunity to attend a course at Columbia University that is made specifically for the winners of this competition! Now I look forward to meeting with professionals of financial journalism from all over the world,” said Maria Solomatova, an economics correspondent for the newspaper St. Petersburg Vedomosti.

Competition Chronology: Acceptance of submissions for the competition was completed on February 22, 2013. On March 5, 2013, members of the independent jury selected the long list of finalists, whose works were recommended for the second stage of consideration. In early-April 2013 Columbia University determined the top finalists and awarded them a trip to the United States to take part in an eight-day training course. The prizewinners will have the opportunity to participate in meetings and seminars with leading figures of the School of Journalism at the Columbia University, academics and politicians, as well as visit key financial institutions and government agencies, including the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), Standard & Poor’s, Federal Reserve Bank and Bloomberg.

The number of articles submitted for evaluation by the independent jury in 2013 almost doubled from the previous year: 165 journalists of Russian federal and regional media submitted 212 works for consideration in the competition.