BAKU, Azerbaijan, Oct. 23
By Eldar Janashvili - Trend:
Azerbaijan has proved that it can solve internal socio-economic problems, Vice President of the Russian Grain Union Alexander Korbut said at the 11th Global Grain Outlook International Grain Trading Conference in Baku, Trend reports from the event Oct. 23.
Korbut said that the information provided by Azerbaijan’s deputy economy minister on harvesting 3.4 million tons of grain in the first nine months of 2019 indicates a significant volume of work done by the Azerbaijani government.
The vice president reminded that in 1992, the volume of grain harvest in Azerbaijan amounted to only 1.3 million tons. Since then, the productivity has grown 2.5 times, despite that the area allotted for grain has changed slightly, and the results are very remarkable, Korbut noted.
Bread makes up half the calories of the human diet, and grain production is directly related to the dynamics of a country’s poverty level, the vice president said. In this regard, Korbut added that over the mentioned period, the number of people living below the poverty line has decreased from 2 million to 200,000 people in the country, despite that the minimum nutrition level according to international standards has increased from 2,000 to 3,000 kilocalories.
“This is a huge work that has been carried out in Azerbaijan,” the vice president said. “The poverty level has been reduced to 200,000 out of 10 million people, even though the country has refugees and internally displaced persons. The state has shown that it can effectively solve this problem.”
The 11th Global Grain Outlook International Grain Trading Conference in Baku is organized by the Russian Grain Union, the Azerbaijan Export and Investment Promotion Foundation (AZPROMO), the Russian Export Center and the Federation of Iranian Food Industries Associations.