Armenia successfully meets economic growth targets – debate

The economic growth targets, outlined in the political parties’ pre-election platforms, have been by and large met in Armenia over the past year to secure a tangible progress, according to politicians.

In a speech at a public debate entitled “Governing Political Parties’ Promises and the Reality: What was Promised and What is Being Done?”, the secretary of the ruling Republican faction in parliament, Gagik Melikyan, addressed particularly their coalition program with the Armenian Revolutionary Federation-Dashnaksutyun (ARF-D), highlighting the faster paces of progress compared to the other countries in the region.

“In 2017, we managed to secure a 7.7% economic growth, as well as a higher gross domestic product, and an economic activity above 12%. I find it really very important as [such a result] is not easily achievable, especially in a region like ours,” he said.

According to Suren Parsyan, a top representative of the ARF-D Development and Economic Research Center, the coalition plan was based largely upon the two parties’ pre-election programs and “progressive ideas and opinions proposed by the society”.

“We particularly [proposed a plan] for securing a 5% annual economic growth. And we have been able to realize that objective, increasing the exports to 40% against the GDP. So our export growth is 25.2% this year; we additionally intend to increase the salaries by 25%, considering specific steps and making specific calculations for that purpose,” he added.

Gagik Makaryan, the president of the Republican Union of Employers, also admitted the existing positive dynamics.

“Fact-based analyses, conducted among hundreds of employers since 2016, revealed seven basic obstacles, including specifically the shadow [income] and poor governance, corruption and unequal competition,” he said, stressing further the importance of confidence-building as the most important precondition to future progress.