Assessment of Armenia's economic growth potential requires certain caution - ex-finance minister

YEREVAN, November 10. /ARKA/. Some caution should be exercised in assessing Armenia’s economic potential, ex-finance minister Vardan Aramyan, said in the Special Opinion program on the YouTube channel of Novosti-Armenia news agency.

Regarding the Central Bank's forecast of 5.6% growth of economy in 2024, Aramyan said this is the inertial growth that the economy is able to generate in the absence of shocks.

The ex-minister recalled that in 2002-2008, when the economic potential was assessed at 6-7%, the real GDP growth in those years was over 10%. ’Life showed that for several years, starting from 2009, Armenia’s economy managed to generate, on average, a growth of 3-4%,’ he said.

"When assessing a growth potential based on numerical series, one should also take into account the GDP structure," he said. Aramyan explained that if the GDP structure is dominated by capital construction, not by the exports, the growth can stop abruptly, as it happened in 2009.

According to Aramyan, Armenia's current economic potential has been strengthened by IT specialists and companies that arrived from Russia, ‘but one should take into account its share in the overall economy and whether the IT industry alone can provide resistance to possible shocks in the current conditions.’

According to him, if the rules of the game change in the future or the inflow of labor force stops, the country may face problems.

The Armenian government’s growth projection for 2024 is 7%; the Central Bank expects GDP to grow by 5.6%. -0-