ArmInfo. Armenia needs the Ministry of Industry and Foreign Trade, Vazgen Safaryan, Chairman of the Union of Domestic Commodity Producers stated at the meeting of the Public Council on Financial-Economic and Budgetary Affairs Commission.
According to him, many countries of the world have such an office, and Armenia should not be an exception. The Ministry would directly deal with the problems of inactive enterprises, which are still quite a lot. The urgency of the issue is all the more grounded that, following the results of 2017, the volume of exports of industrial products was 12.8%, and tend to increase this indicator. "The ideas of wild liberalism have been left behind," the head of the Union believes, adding that today the state should recall its functions as a regulator whose task should be to solve the problem of inventorying the entire industrial potential, in the format of public-private partnership, the development of programs for restarting idle, but perspective enterprises. Vazgen Safaryan stressed that, for example, in Great Britain, the state possesses 53% of participation in fixed assets. In Armenia, however, the participation of the state in the country's economy is limited only by the functions of the regulator.
An important role in the process of involving enterprises should be given to the banking and financial system of Armenia. Today, Vazgen Safaryan continued, commercial banks of the country accumulated 1.7 trillion drams of assets, of which 1.1 trillion - funds of individuals and 600 billion drams - of legal entities. A significant portion of these resources do not work because of high interest rates. Involvement of the state in the process of employing enterprises will lead to an increase in interest on the part of the country's commercial banks, and as a result, funds at affordable interest rates will be used to solve the existing problem. The commission, in turn, will study the state of each enterprise separately, introducing concrete proposals to the executive structures of power, the chairman of the Union of Domestic Commodity Producers said.