Thursday, 16 September 2010
Dear participants of Fruitful Armenia agro-forum,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
First of all, I would like to welcome you to this event. It should be stated that the forum has been gaining in coverage and attractiveness every year, with greater professionalism used in approaches and ever-growing number of participants. It has been instrumental in boosting agricultural activities in the country as it provides a platform for interested debates, exchange of know-how and opinions. A nice tradition is up to involve young researchers in the debates on agricultural problems. Their innovative and exciting suggestions may help promote reforms in the farming sector by implementing new business projects and mobilizing scientific-creative capacity.
The agenda features two main topics: developing and enhancing the efficiency of viticulture which has always been a key branch of Armenia’s farming sector. Viticulture has seen a tide of private investments over the past few years. On the one hand, this helps improve the quality of grapes by introducing new technologies, promote consolidation of lands and boost competition in this field. On the other hand, we can see that keen competition generates serious problems as in this way the small farmers can loose their competitiveness. In such an event, they will have to go communities, adopt a single strategy and take a share in future cooperatives by joining each other in making investments. Either the government is taking measures to ensure that small farmers are reorganized into cooperatives in order to maintain a competitive edge. Moreover, State assistance is supposed to go to such entities as may come together in cooperative unions.
We have also passed a number of key agriculture development-related documents. The first one is the concept note on agriculture development which was redrafted and rewritten after long debates involving stakeholders and civil society. The second one is the new concept on the ways inputs and machinery will be made available to farmers. In particular, it is stipulated the equipment imported from China and Japan will be supplied first of all to consolidated entities. This is supposed to promote consolidation in the farming sector. The third document relates to seed breeding which is to be modernized in Armenia. Again, this is expected to create additional incentives for unification.
Viticulture is vital to our country especially at this stage of development. It is not a secret that we have had numerous sales bottlenecks in recent years. Our farmers would face serious challenges if they fail to realize the stocks of produced grapes. This means that besides its economic impact, viticulture has social and political dimensions as well. Agricultural policy should be predictable and clear to our farmers. In turn, they are supposed to take account of those programs implemented in the country.
This year we faced several problems in agriculture due to climatic threats. Notwithstanding, we are in for a slight growth in the field of viticulture owing to recent years’ investment-driven modernization efforts: the processing-sales circuit implies the availability of high-capacity processing entities. We are still short of such leading brands as may be competitive on the international markets.
First of all, we should understand how we can win a place on the world markets. Individual companies cannot cope with this task on their own. A public-private sector cooperation-based strategy has to be developed in order to facilitate this task. Another important task is to ensure that domestic grapes are eligible for export. Under the second agenda item, the forum will address the possibility of setting up freezing facilities and a free economic zone at Zvartnots international airport. Therefore, a new logistical scheme will have to be developed to agricultural exports from Armenia.
The State’s support of small farms is not as effective as it could have been, because they have had problems in selling their products. We hope to cope with this handicap by founding a free economic zone at the airport. At the same time, special labs should be set up to monitor product quality so that it meets the international standards.
Another key factor is that wholesale companies will be invited to operate within the free economic zone, closer to communities. The contracts signed with local farmers will have a competitive bias to cover only high-quality products.
The World Bank‘s program, too, seeks to enhance efficiency through expert advice provided by means of community-based field offices. These two issues featuring on the forum agenda are kept in focus by the government. Our concept proceeds from the understanding that modern agriculture is impossible without modern communities. Either the world agricultural forum concentrates on the vision of 21st century’s agriculture.
Agriculture and rural communities should be deemed as a united whole if we are to provide for better living standards in the countryside. This means that the updated processing, marketing and logistical schemes should reach every single community generating thousands of new jobs. Also, this implies higher level of diversification for the farming sector in line with the government’s priority.
I wish the forum successful proceedings.
