Amit Batabyal is an expert on microeconomic issues in general and international politics with particular reference to South Asia.

He can also speak on natural resources and the environment, international economic development and international trade, South Asian politics and economics, globalization and its impact on rich and poor nations, and corruption and bribery in developing countries. Also regional economic growth and development and the management of invasive species.

He has published more than 500 books, book chapters, refereed journal articles and book reviews. Batabyal has presented research at conferences and in universities in North America, South America, Europe, Asia and Australia and won numerous national and international awards for research.

At RIT, his primary responsibilities are research, teaching and service.

Batabyal earned his bachelor's in applied economics and business management from Cornell University (1987), master's in agricultural and applied economics from University of Minnesota (1990), and Ph.D. in agricultural and resource economics from University of California at Berkeley (1994).

Thomas D. Hopkins is Professor of Economics at Rochester Institute of Technology. He served as Dean of the College of Business 1998-2005 and as President, U.S. Business School in Prague, Czech Republic, an RIT MBA program where he taught 1992-98. He was the Arthur J. Gosnell Professor of Economics in RIT's College of Liberal Arts, 1988 - 98. Hopkins held senior management positions in two White House agencies during the Ford, Carter and Reagan Administrations, including service as Deputy Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the White House Office of Management and Budget. In 1979 President Carter appointed him a charter member of the federal government’s Senior Executive Service. His research on business burdens of government regulation has been sponsored by the Organization for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD) in Paris and the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) in Washington. He has testified on regulatory policy issues before committees of the U.S. Senate and House, and Canada’s House of Commons. He co-authored a 2001 SBA report, “The Impact of Regulatory Costs on Small Firms,” as well as National Research Council reports on marine transportation, the Exxon Valdez oil spill, and trucking/rail/barge transportation. He previously was on the faculty of American University, University of Maryland, and Bowdoin College.