Arif Veliyev, the Chairman of the State Statistics Committee of Azerbaijan, stated at a news conference on 26 October that over the first 9 months of 2006, without consideration of the oil sector, the rise of GDP was 8%, Trend reports. Azerbaijan is behind Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus for the amount of per capita income of gross product.
Veliyev noted that during this period the rise was observed in all fields of economy, excluding agriculture where a 1% drop was fixed. The production in the grain production fell by 2%, while the collection of other agriculture products (potato, cotton, vegetable) is still underway. However, the Committee forecast a drop in the harvesting as compared to last year due to unfavorable weather conditions and drop in the sown areas. A 3% fall was observed in plant sowing and 1.6% in cattle breeding.
Meanwhile, over 9 months a rise in credit investments made up 55%, community deposits 48% to 668mln manats, capita investing 16.4% to 4,251bln manats. The average monthly salary was $160, whereas per capita income constituted 888 manats.