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ISET Economist Blog

A blog about economics in the South Caucasus.
May
22

Georgia Doubled the Area of Cultivated Agricultural Land in 2013

According to available data from the ministry of agriculture (MoA), by 1 May, 2013, 400,000 hectares have been cultivated this year in Georgia, which means a 100% increase compared to last year and the highest figure, by far, since 2005. In fact, this is the highest yearly increase in cultivated area Georgia recorded during the last decades. In total, Georgia has around  800,000 hectares of agricultural land (i.e. land suitable for cultivation). Table: Georgian agricultural land in cultivation (hectares), 1990-2013   Source...
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May
20

Does Georgia Need Its Own Currency?

According to the Biblical Book of Genesis, Adam ate the forbidden apple, and now we all have to face the consequences: men have to work “by the sweat of their face” and women have “in pain to bring forth children”. Ever since this fateful event, known as the “Original Sin”, the human condition has become a mess, of which(perhaps) the state of the world economy provides a vivid illustration. When economists talk about the “original sin”, they have in mind a situation where a country or company is forced to borrow in a foreign currency. Thus, as they accum...
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May
15

Georgian Wine Industry: Recent Past and the Way Forward

We are very happy to host on our blog a commentary by Jacques Fleury, the person behind the resurrection of Borjomi and a key player in the Georgian wine industry. Jacques reflects on the experience of surviving the Russian embargo, on the one hand, and dealing with a series of heavy-handed and incompetent government interventions, on the other. In the second part of his comment, to be published next week, Jacques also proposes a new vision for the future of the Georgian wine industry, a future in which the government and the private sector work hand-in-...
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May
13

Georgia's Education System Reforms: Corruption is Gone but Where is the Quality?

A country without oil needs smart people! This clearly applies to Georgia. Not endowed with substantial amounts of natural resources, Georgia totally depends on its human resources. Yet how good is the intellectual equipment of the Georgians that is so urgently required for driving the economic development of this country? When it comes to applied knowledge that can directly be utilized for economic activities, the picture is rather disenchanting. According to UNDP data, 81% of Georgian unemployed completed secondary or higher education. Yet as we wrote ...
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