The Government of the Republic of Armenia has undertaken the preparation of a comprehensive poverty reduction strategy paper. For this purpose the Government has already approved an Interim Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper, developed with active participation of the civil society. The objective of the strategy is to resolve the socio-economic problems and, in particular, to reduce poverty parallel to policies stimulating economic growth. The paper describes the current poverty situation in Armenia, identifies priorities and actions in specific sectors for alleviating poverty. The Interim Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper contains also a description of monitoring indicators, which would allow monitoring of the efficiency of implementation throughout the program period, including with the involvement of the civil society.

A Steering Committee for the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper has been established with broad participation from representatives of the social and economic policy implementing agencies, parliamentary committees and political parties represented in the Parliament, civil society, and the donor community, with the purpose of organizing the preparation and implementation of Poverty Reduction Strategy. The Steering Committee has already started the organization of developing the comprehensive strategy, which will be done with the involvement of the civil society. In particular, it is assumed that the paper itself will be developed by independent local experts, and throughout its preparation an organization selected specifically for that purpose will be responsible for ensuring broad participation of civil society in the process of preparation of the paper, as well as providing regular information to the public on the process itself.