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A blog about economics in the South Caucasus.

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Charles Johnson, Eric Livny
Eric Livny
Jun
29

Why Armenia Is Not (Yet) Ukraine?

Energy & Environment
  Yerevan is presently rife with protest. Dubbed “Electric Yerevan,” the protests are aptly named considering that they began as a result of Armenia’s government succumbing to demands by the country’s electricity distribution monopoly (Electric Network of Armenia (ENA)) to raise regulated tariffs by 16.7% as of 1 August, 2015. ENA is owned by Inter RAO UES, a Russian energy giant, giving rise to suggestions that Armenian officials are effectively serving Russian interests. Yet, the hike in electricity prices, which the government had initially resis...
Tags:
energy ukraine armenia reforms
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Recent Comments
Guest — David Lee
I think that there is a danger of viewing all political and economic problems in the wider region, let use the Eastern Partnership... Read More
Monday, 29 June 2015 8:08 AM
Guest — Mikayel Badalyan
I would have deleted the word "yet" from the title and here is why:Let's measure the prices in USD!!!In Ukraine the gas price incr... Read More
Monday, 29 June 2015 10:10 AM
Guest — Eric Livny
Thanks, Michael, for your "Armenian insider" viewpoint. Just for me to understand better, you are saying that Armenia's electricit... Read More
Tuesday, 30 June 2015 9:09 AM
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Eric Livny
Apr
17

Lessons Learned From a Decade of Georgian Reforms. View From The Sky

Macroeconomics
Georgian reforms have become an internationally traded commodity. Underappreciated and no longer wanted at home, some of Georgia’s former reformers are doing well-paid consulting gigs in Mongolia, Central Asia, Ukraine, Moldova and further away emerging markets. Sensing a business opportunity, a group of former government officials groomed by Kakha Bendukidze, the mastermind of Georgian reforms, has recently established a consulting agency, “Reformatics”. “The chosen”, such as Georgia’s former Minister of Health Sandro Kvitashvili and former Deputy Minis...
Tags:
economic reforms ukraine
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Guest — Ia
Fantastic article and very balanced analysis.In my point of view Saakashvili has without question succeeded in turning Georgia tow... Read More
Friday, 17 April 2015 7:07 PM
Guest — Eric Livny
Thank you, Ia! We should be the first to learn from our successes and failures!
Friday, 17 April 2015 7:07 PM
Guest — Iñigo A
The summary of Ukraine's future is in the sentence above "to learn from ... successes and failures!". As for the latter, the orang... Read More
Monday, 20 April 2015 4:04 PM
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Yasya Babych, Lasha Arevadze
Lasha Arevadze
Jan
23

Georgia’s Trade in 2014: Does Export Decline Suggest a Loss of Competitiveness?

Macroeconomics
According to the latest GEOSTAT figures, merchandize exports from Georgia decreased by 1.63% between 2013 and 2014. This is certainly not great news for the country, but does it imply that Georgian goods have become less competitive on the world market? Recent trade data suggest that this is not necessarily the case. The first thing to note is that much of the decline in exports is related to one particular activity – the re-exports of Georgian cars to Azerbaijan and Armenia. Beginning in 2009, this business has become a “cash cow”, capitalizin...
Tags:
ukraine trade macroeconomics georgia export
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Recent Comments
Guest — Nino
Congratulations with the first piece, Lasha! The piece is very timely and encouraging!
Tuesday, 27 January 2015 2:02 PM
Guest — megiddo02
An overly optimistic piece. We see one of main "business models" of Georgia -- car reexports -- disappearing. 25% of Georgian expo... Read More
Sunday, 01 February 2015 3:03 PM
Guest — Y
The main argument the article is advancing is not that everything is going peachy in Georgia with regards to exports, but rather ... Read More
Tuesday, 03 February 2015 11:11 AM
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Eric Livny, Tom Coupe
Tom Coupe
Oct
17

Handling Frozen Conflicts: the Economic Angle

Governance and Social Policy
It now seems more and more likely that Eastern Donbass (the area currently controlled by the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics) will become a frozen conflict zone, a territory in which the Ukrainian government will have little power to enforce its laws and where slowly a parallel governance system, an unrecognized ‘quasi-state’, will emerge. In the absence of a viable military alternative, one option likely to be considered by Ukraine and its Western allies is to exercise ‘strategic patience’. As discussed in a Foreign Policy article...
Tags:
trade politics ukraine georgia
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Recent Comments
Guest — Zurab Garakanidze
October 17, 2014 To: ISET From: Z. Garakanidze, Ph.D(Economics), Tbilisi, Georgia; Ass. Professor of the Georgian University. Tbil... Read More
Friday, 17 October 2014 2:02 PM
Guest — Simon Appleby
An interesting article. Mainland China and Taiwan (another quasi-state backed by a powerful patron) agreed on a basic compact allo... Read More
Sunday, 19 October 2014 6:06 AM
Guest — Eric Livny
Thanks for your comment, Simon... We limited the scope of the article to the post-Soviet space, but Taiwan-China example is perhap... Read More
Sunday, 19 October 2014 7:07 AM
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