The Moldovan universities are not among the top 500 universities in the world though some of them are better than higher education establishments of Russia and other countries, the rector of the Academy of Economic Studies Grigore Belostecinic said in a news conference, quoted by Info-Prim Neo. The Moldovan education institutions were included for the first time in the Academic Ranking of World Universities published by the Shanghai Ranking Consultancy. Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic and the Baltic countries have by at least one university competitive at world level. 17 of the top 19 universities are from the U.S. The 20th – Cambridge - is European. The first three spots are occupied by Harvard, Stanford and the University of California, Berkeley. The Moscow University “Mihail Lomonosov” takes the 219th position, the Iasi University “Alexandru Ioan Cuza” – the 576th, while the Suceava University “Stefan cel Mare” – the 1,886th. The Technical University of Moldova ranks 3,315th, the Academy of Economic Studies – 3,421st, the State University of Moldova - 4,525th, the Free International University – 5,765th, the University of Medicine and Pharmacology “Nicolae Testemiţanu – 6,439th. The Academic Ranking of World Universities compares higher education institutions worldwide according to a formula that takes into account alumni winning Nobel Prizes and Fields Medals, staff winning Nobel Prizes and Fields Medals, articles published in Nature and Science etc. The Webometrics Ranking of World Universities includes 17,716 universities from 199 countries.