BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept. 17
By Zeyni Jafarov – Trend:
The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has caused unprecedented damage to the global economic development, trade flows, as well as health and social security systems both around the world and in Azerbaijan, Azerbaijani Minister of Finance Samir Sharifov said.
Sharifov made the remark at a webinar organized by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) within the 53rd Annual Meeting of the Board of Governors entitled "Results and ways of development", Trend reports.
“Presently, the problems related to the economic development and trade flows are not a top priority requiring a first-priority solution,” the minister said.
“During the COVID-19 pandemic, the countries of the Central Asia Regional Economic Cooperation Program (CAREC) are primarily fighting the pandemic to ensure human health and safety, and that is why the issues of economic development and trade flows fade into the background,” Sharifov added.
Nevertheless, the minister stressed that each crisis creates new challenges for development, and thus Azerbaijan supports the ADB initiative, which is implemented under the CAREC program to organize such events.
The views on the promotion of regional cooperation during the COVID-19 pandemic, which had a negative impact on global and regional trade were exchanged during the webinar.
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