In terms of GDP per capita, Armenia is in first place in South  Caucasus - Pashinyan

ArmInfo. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan's working visit to France continues.As the press service of the RA Premier reports, on the morning of February 22, the Prime Minister visited the "Elite Club of Political Dialogue", where he had a meeting with the heads of a group of large  French companies operating in various fields.

The Prime Minister referred to the rates of economic development of  Armenia, the prospects of economic activity, the programs implemented  by the Government in the field of economy, the steps to improve the  business environment, the opportunities for investment programs.

In his speech, the Prime Minister noted that by the results of 2023,  the revenues of the state budget of Armenia have almost doubled  compared to 2018. the increase is more than 90 percent. "This means  that many significant changes have taken place to reduce the shadow  economy and improve the competitive situation in the country. In  2023, the economic growth in Armenia was 8.7 percent, which is  obviously a high indicator. In 2022, our economic growth was 12.6  percent, in 2021 - 5.6 percent," said Nikol Pashinyan.  The Prime  Minister noted that a significant improvement in jobs has taken  place. "Since 2018, 180,000 new jobs have been created in Armenia.  And that's about a 30 percent increase in total jobs. The year 2023  was also significant in that we made significant progress in terms of  GDP per capita, and in fact, we are now in the first place in the  South Caucasus.

Of course, the investments and economic cooperation we have with  France are very significant and important for us. Of course, the  rather long and noticeable presence of "Pernod Ricard" in the  Republic of Armenia was already mentioned, and also a number of other  companies operate in the banking system of Armenia, in the management  of pension funds. I want to mention the presence of "Veolia" company  in Armenia. And we recently discussed that we should intensify and  deepen our cooperation in the water sector. With the results of the  extraordinary elections of 2021, we have set a task to ensure an  average annual economic growth of 7 percent, and we hope that new  French companies will also come to Armenia, will operate in various  fields, because we also need support for implementing the ambitious  plan of 7 percent economic growth", said the Prime Minister.

Nikol Pashinyan emphasized that significant projects are being  implemented in the field of economic modernization. "In terms of  investment programs, I would like to draw attention to the program of  building 300 schools and 500 kindergartens in Armenia. We are  interested to see construction companies that may be interested in  participating in those tenders. There is the North-South project,  which is a project worth 1 billion USD or more," said the Prime  Minister.

Nikol Pashinyan drew the attention of French companies to the  "Academic City" project. "We want to create and establish a new city  in the field of higher education. We have already started concrete  works in that direction.

I have to record that we are interested in serious investment  projects in the field of manufacturing industry.  The field of  information technology continues to be one of the leading branches of  our economy. And now the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of  High-tech Industry are in discussions with the sector to see how we  can improve the legal regulations of the IT sector to make our  country more attractive in that sense.  In 2023, the Republic of  Armenia recorded very visible progress in the field of tourism, in  the sense that the inflow of tourists has already exceeded the  indicator of 2019. Now winemaking is also developing at a very good  pace in Armenia, and I think there is investment potential here as  well. We have an extensive program of reservoir construction. In  particular, the construction project of 15 medium and small  reservoirs is currently underway. We have chosen this as a strategy,"  said the Prime Minister.

Next, issues related to cooperation and the possibilities of  implementation of projects in the fields of construction,  infrastructure development, agriculture, tourism, high technologies,  and industry were discussed. The Prime Minister answered the  questions of the companies participating in the meeting.

Nikol Pashinyan had separate meetings with the heads of Thales,  IDEMIA companies operating in the field of latest technologies,  "Pernod Ricard", Societe des Troia-Valles operating in the field of  tourism.  However, it is noteworthy that in addition to the  successful enterprise examples of French investors working in  Armenia, there were also unsuccessful ones, such as the withdrawal of  leading French telecom operator, Orange, and Credit Agricole bank  from the Armenian market.