Wednesday, October 16 2019 19:44

ArmInfo. The Ministry of Economy of Armenia proposes to raise the upper threshold of the loan provided to processing enterprises so that they can fulfill their financial obligations to winegrowers of the Areni community of Vayots Dzor  region.

So, according to the press service of the Ministry of Economy, the  head of the department Tigran Khachatryan and the Minister of  Territorial Administration and Infrastructures Suren Papikyan met  with the winegrowers of the larger Areni community.

As a result of the discussions, an agreement was reached on the  quickest possible payment for the delivered harvest of ''Khardzhi''  grapes. To this end, the Ministry of Economy took the initiative to  amend the decision of the Government of the Republic of Armenia dated  February 28, 2019, within the framework of which it is proposed to  increase the upper threshold of the loan provided to the procurers  for the implementation of financial obligations to winegrowers.

"It is planned that the draft decision will be discussed and adopted  at the upcoming meeting of the government," the press service of the  department said.

Earlier, on October 10, at the Cabinet meeting, Prime Minister of  Armenia Nikol Pashinyan announced that there would be no problems  with the purchase of grapes in Armenia this year, prices and volume  of purchases were rising, "and there is no noise in this regard." On  October 12, residents of the village of Aghavnadzor in the Vayots  Dzor region of Armenia blocked the Yerevan-Meghri highway in protest  against the reduction in purchase prices for grapes. As the peasants  stated last year, Khardzhi grapes were purchased by the processing  enterprises at 470 drams per kilogram (almost $ 1), now the  procurers, who guaranteed its purchase last year at the same price,  do not give more than 225 drams. As they stated, the procurers  themselves do not make contact with farmers. And again, the last hope  is the power, which, according to the villagers, is obliged to take  up the resolution of the issue, finally embarking on its regulatory  functions.

To recall, in 2017, the Ministry of Agriculture of Armenia, in order  to solve the problems with large debts of processing enterprises to  farmers, and to provide working capital for procurers, in a pilot  mode proposed a new affordable lending program for processing  enterprises. According to the authors of the initiative, this will  allow introducing a new culture of contractual relations between the  farmer and the procurers, as well as making payments for deliveries  immediately. Given the size of state subsidies at 9%, the annual  interest rate for borrowers actually decreased to 3%. In 2018, the  loan portfolio of the program was expanded from 2.4 billion drams to  18 billion drams, and the maximum loan size per borrower was  increased from 150 million drams to 1 billion drams.