Tackling expected inflation, ensuring product reserves – President-elect on government actions

YEREVAN, MARCH 10, ARMENPRESS. President-elect Vahagn Khachaturyan says the Armenian government is working to tackle the serious economic challenges which appeared as a result of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict.

“We are assessing our opportunities, indeed our domestic resources of grain productions have dropped, but this shortfall will be filled in other ways,” Khachaturyan told reporters after the Cabinet meeting.

At the same time, Khachaturyan warned of expected difficulties because the grain harvest which was supposed to come from Ukraine will not be supplied.

“Some obstacles could happen in terms of our trade relations with Russia because we are bringing individual types of products from Russia. Besides traditional products – grain, vegetable oil and so on, there are other types of products, which our companies represented in Armenia are importing, but their main offices are in Russia, but they don’t work there now. Meaning, the situation is so convoluted now that the government is now trying to open this loop and understand what needs to be done. This work is being done,” he added.

Khachaturyan added that the first objective on the agenda is to tackle the expected inflation, one of the steps is to have product reserves.

“But wheat prices grew 50 dollars in the international market at once, now we don’t know what the oil prices will be, because everything is interrelated with oil prices. We must have the pessimistic scenario in mind, but our moods in the society and in business circles should not be guided with this pessimistic scenario, but in milder scenarios, where people are convinced that the state is doing everything to support businesses. This all could also lead to a drop in budget revenues,” Khachaturyan said.