ArmInfo.In Armenia, the growth of economic activity in January- September 2023 slowed to 9.7% per annum (from last year's 14.1%), accompanied by a noticeable slowdown in the upward dynamics of exports and imports.
According to statistics, the growth in economic activity in January-September 2023 was determined by the trade sector - by 23.3% per annum, the construction sector - by 17% and the service sector - by 13.4%, and to a much lesser extent the agricultural sector - by 1.7% . The energy complex and the industrial sector fell by 2.8% and 0.6%, respectively. A year earlier, in January-September 2022, only the agricultural sector was in decline by 0.7%, and all other sectors showed double-digit growth rates: the service sector - by 27.1%, the energy sector - by 16.9%, the trade sector - by 14 .5%, the construction sector - by 14.3%, the industrial sector - by 10%.
According to statistical data for January-September 2023, in absolute value the leadership is held by the trade sector with a volume of 3.8 trillion. drams ($9.6 billion). The second place in terms of volume is occupied by the service sector - 2.2 trillion drams ($5.7 billion), third - the industrial sector - 1.8 trillion ($4.7 billion), fourth - the agricultural sector - 619.7 billion ($1.6 billion), fifth - the construction sector - 349.3 billion drams ($898.6 million). ). The volume of electricity generation in January-September 2023 amounted to 6343.7 million kWh, of which in September alone - 630.8 million kWh.
At the same time, in September of this year. by September 2022, economic activity also slowed down in growth to 5.6% (from 14.6% a year earlier), which is also observed on a monthly basis with growth slowing to 3.7% in September from 6.2% in August, against last year's acceleration growth in September from 1.6% to 8.9%.
On an annual basis (September 2023 to September 2022), all sectors showed an upward trend, with the exception of the industrial sector and the energy complex, which were in decline by 4.3% and 3.9%, respectively. In particular, the trade sector showed the highest annual growth - by 24.2%, followed by the growth rate of the construction sector - 15.7% and the service sector - 4.6%. A year earlier, in September 2022, all areas showed growth by September 2021, and the energy complex and industrial sector managed to emerge from the recession and ensure a significant increase in volumes: the service sector - 26.3%, the trade sector - 20.7%, the energy complex - 19.3% , industrial sector - 14.8% and construction sector - 14.6%.
Against this background, Armenia's foreign trade turnover in January-September 2023 amounted to 5.3 trillion. drams ($13.7 billion) with a slowdown in annual growth to 47.2% (from last year's 62.5%). This is due to the slowdown in annual growth of both exports - from 63.8% to 48.5%, and imports - from 61.6% to 46.48%, the absolute value of which amounted to 2 trillion and 3.3 trillion drams ($5.2 billion and $8.5) respectively.
In September 2023, compared to September 2022, foreign trade turnover increased by 15.9% due to an increase in exports by 31.5% and imports by 5.6%, while in last year's annual dynamics (September 2022 compared to September 2021) there was a jump foreign trade turnover doubled due to a jump in exports by 2.5 times and a high growth in imports by 82.2%.
The average settlement exchange rate of the dram was 386.94 dr/$1 in September 2023, and 388.71 dr/$1 in January-September 2023.