"Farmer Movement" NGO Head  predicts difficult agricultural year

ArmInfo. The year 2018 for Armenia will turn out to be of low yield and complexity from the point of view of agricultural production. Such a forecast during a press conference on February 12 was given by Sargis Sedrakyan, chairman of the "Farmer Movement" NGO.

In general, the expert determined his point of view with weather conditions, stressing in this connection that the irrigation of the gardens was not carried out in sufficient measure. In addition, he expressed some concerns about the expected frosts, given that in some areas of Armenia trees are beginning to bud.

The government, he said further, links unreasonably high expectations to the development of agricultural production, equating Armenia with Singapore. In this context, he severely criticized the program for installing drip irrigation systems and anti-hail nets, the cost of which for 1 hectare is, according to him, about $ 25 thousand. "A farmer can not afford it", considering the already existing debt burden", he said.

The government called agriculture a priority direction of development, the expert said. As key problems, he noted first of all the lack of a real desire on the part of the authorities to develop agriculture. Secondly, according to him, the targeted use of funds that come to the country is not monitored. In addition, S.  Sedrakyan stressed that today the issue of the lack of good specialists in the top hierarchy of relevant departments is acute. "If we solve all these problems, we can already talk about the possibility of turning Armenia into a country with a high level of developed agriculture," he said. In addition, the expert noted that for the development of the agricultural sector it is necessary to involve the Diaspora, urging the authorities to conduct appropriate work in this direction.

According to the National Statistical Service of Armenia, the gross agricultural output was 935.8 billion AMD with an annual decline of 2.9%. Only agriculture showed a decline of 3% to 906.7 billion AMD, with a decline in crop production by 7.2% and an increase in livestock production by 2.2%.