On October 3, 2017, ISET Policy Institute Executive Director Lasha Labadze made a presentation at the conference "Modern Educational Programs to Support Agribusiness Development,” organized by East European University within the International Scientific Festival, planned by the Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia. Other conference participants were representatives of the Agricultural Cooperative Development Agency, the National Wine Agency of the Ministry of Agriculture, and the Community College “Gldani Vocational Training Center”.

Doctor Labadze presented the current situation of the agricultural sector in Georgia, with an emphasis on the importance of conducting a thorough analysis of the value chains of different product and identify weak and problematic areas, in order to create and develop sustainable business models for agriculture in Georgia. Despite the numerous large-scale projects implemented in the sector by both the state and donor organizations, the sector is still underdeveloped.

Agriculture remains the most unproductive sector in Georgia, where stubbornly high levels of unproductive self-employment have not significantly changed for the last ten years. According to Dr. Labadze, one of the main reasons for the current situation is a lack of education and skills necessary for engaging in more productive urban sector employment or for better managing agricultural businesses (by expansion, employing modern technologies, etc.). In his presentation, Dr. Labadze also emphasized Georgia’s lack of professional agricultural skills, the absence of modern technologies and processing production lines, along with the problem of coordination between different players in value chains.

The conference main topic of discussion was identifying existing problems in the country in terms of agri-business development, and the ways to solve them.