BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 14
By Zeyni Jafarov – Trend:
This week, the State Statistical Committee of Azerbaijan released statistical data for January 2021, Trend reports.
Azerbaijan's GDP in January 2021 decreased in annual terms by 2.5 percent and amounted to 6.25 billion manat ($3.67 billion).
The consumer price index (CPI) in Azerbaijan in January 2021 increased by 3.3 percent compared to January 2020, including for food, beverages and tobacco products - by 4.6 percent, non-food products - by 3.5 percent, paid services to the population - by 1.3 percent.
In 2020, the number of employees in Azerbaijan increased by 45,200 people, or 2.7 percent, compared to 2019. Thus, the number of employees has reached 1.69 million people, of which 910,800 people work in the public sector of the economy, and 781,000 - in the private sector.
Moreover, the Ministry of Finance of Azerbaijan published information this week on the execution of the state and consolidated budgets of Azerbaijan for 2020. Thus, revenues of the consolidated budget of Azerbaijan in 2020 were equal to 24.4 billion manat ($14.3 billion), which is 9.4 percent more than the forecast. The expenditures of the 2020 budget amounted to 29.1 billion manat ($17.1 billion), which is 2.65 billion manat ($1.55 billion), or 10 percent, more than in 2019. Consequently, the budget deficit equaled 4.7 billion manat ($2.76 billion), which is 40.9 percent less than the forecasted figure.
This week, Visa launched the Visa Everywhere Initiative 2021, a global innovation program and idea competition for fintech companies. At the first stage, all candidates from Azerbaijan are invited to participate in the competition for the Central Europe, Middle East and Africa (CEMEA) region. According to the company, in 2021, the program will focus on expanding financial inclusion and payment acceptance.
Besides, this week, Azerbaijan’s Minister of Economy Mikayil Jabbarov in the format of a video conference received a delegation of the World Bank (WB), headed by the country manager for Azerbaijan Sarah Michael.
During the meeting, Jabbarov emphasized that Azerbaijan attaches great importance to cooperation with the World Bank, and these ties are multifaceted.
Also, the meeting participants discussed the directions of development of cooperation with the WB and support for the reforms carried out in Azerbaijan, the importance of special economic and financial research that the World Bank will conduct in Azerbaijan was noted.
This week, Jabbarov also noted that the active participation of banks in financing the real sector is a priority and small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) will be more widely involved in government orders, and stressed that institutional reforms and new legislative initiatives are planned for this purpose.
The outgoing week was also remembered by the strengthening of the euro and lira against the manat, and the rise in oil prices.
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