YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 24, ARMENPRESS. Armenia has recorded unprecedented progress in economic competition in 2018, according to Artak Shaboyan – president of the State Commission for the Protection of Economic Competition of Armenia.

Shaboyan presented the annual report of his commission during a press conference today.

“The World Economic Forum is the only international organization that is calculating and assessing the competitive environment in all countries of the world annually,” he said. “By assessments of the current year, Armenia has improved its positions by 9 notches in the economic competition sector and currently it is ranked 19th among 140 countries of the world", he said, adding that last year Armenia was ranked 28th.

In the ranking Armenia is ahead of the other EEU countries – Russia is 63rd, Kazakhstan is 84th and Kyrgyzstan is 102nd.

“We are also ahead of a number of regional, CIS and Eastern European countries. Georgia is 80th, Lithuania is 87rd, Latvia is 58th, Slovakia is 82nd, Hungary is 99th, Moldova is 119th, Turkey is 86th. We are greatly focusing on those socially significant product markets that have high centralization, i.e. where dominant businesses exist, because they too might abuse their positions,” he said.

Shaboyan noted that the access of new businesses carrying out both imports and exports in dozens of areas after the country joined the EEU has also positively impacted the competitive situation. He said that this has brought activeness into the market, by reducing the centralization in several sectors.

Edited and translated by Stepan Kocharyan