Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 13
By Jeyhun Alakbarov, Anvar Mammadov – Trend:
The increase in penetration of non-cash payments may have a positive impact on the GDP of Azerbaijan, chief of national payment systems development at the Central Bank of Azerbaijan (CBA) Ramil Mahmudov said Sept. 13 during a training for journalists.
"Studies by the world's leading agencies show that even a 1-percent increase in the volume of non-cash payments can increase the country's GDP by almost 10 percent. In this way, we can significantly increase tax revenues, strengthen the banking sector," Mahmudov said.
He noted that for the development of non-cash payments in the country, first of all, it is necessary to increase the stability of the banking sector and to achieve its revival.
"As you know, after the devaluation of the national currency in 2015, the banking sector had a certain amount of toxic assets. In this regard, the Central Bank and the Financial Market Supervisory Authority of Azerbaijan have taken a number of measures, thanks to which the banking sector has slightly recovered. However, in this situation, we still have some work to do. Given that the banking sector is the main locomotive of non-cash payments, its stability is a necessary condition for the development of non-cash payments," Mahmudov said.
In addition, Mahmudov said, for the development of electronic payments, it is also necessary to create a favorable ecosystem - to increase the number of POS terminals, to develop the necessary software.
"Today, we live in a period of technology development. There are new trends, such as blockchain and others, so it is necessary to constantly keep pace with progress," Mahmudov said. "In this regard, we must actively develop e-commerce, given that we have the necessary capacity to do so."