“We are suggesting on using something which will help evaluate the
advantages and disadvantages that Armenia has as a competitive country
and will also help in formulating an economic strategy. This, of
course, if everything goes as planned,” said president of the “Economy
and Values” research center Manuk Hergnyan.
This year, Armenia has been included in the “World Competitive Report”
(WCR) for the first time ever. The latter is a report which is composed
by the World Economy Forum (WEF) and is published since 1979. The WEF
is a non profit, independent organization and its goal is to develop
enterprise and help raise the level of economy. The organization has
branches around the world. The “Economy and Values” center in Armenia
collaborates with the WEF. When it comes to evaluation, the WCR uses
the statistics as well as the surveys taken by the managers of the
companies (107 companies have participated in the survey in Armenia).
What is the WCR? The WCR is an index which includes the three indexes
of rise in competition as a whole, business and world competition. The
WCR is the only one in its kind and it includes three large
technologies, a macro-economical environment and public institutions
(including corruption). In this index, Armenia places 79th in the 117
countries, however, if we look at it from a different perspective, this
is rather interesting. Information technologies have been declared as
the leading economic field in Armenia, but according to the index on
technologies, our country places 94th in the world. We are ”proud” that
we are a stable, macro-economical country (ranking 55th) and we don’t
take into consideration Azerbaijan’s rating in the world, which places
18th . In the business index, Armenia places 88th and it gives way to
the CIS countries such as Azerbaijan, Russia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan.
As for the 3rd world competitive index, Armenia places 81st. This index
includes the first two indices and provides an opportunity to evaluate
the country’s micro and macro economical environments,
What’s interesting though is that the Armenian businessmen believe that
the most important factors are taxing policies, corruption and lack of
financial means. We all agree that corruption doesn’t allow business to
move forward, but it is wrong to place that first and forget about the
rest of the factors. Today, Armenia has much more problems which don’t
allow business to progress. Our country’s economy places almost last in
the index due to the level of development of the financial market,
copyrights, importance of social security of businesses, confidence in
professional managers, use of marketing instruments, provision of small
share-holdings, etc.
Let’s go back to the serious problems facing the telecommunications and
information technologies in Armenia. Armenia places last in cell phone
connection, 105th in quality of telephone/fax substructures, 86th in
Internet users and 89th in overall use of computers at home. Judging
from this, we can see why we are the 109th country in the IT field and
96th in the level of technology. As we can see, we still have a long
road before we reach international standards, but if we really want it,
we can achieve any goal we set forward.
However, Armenia also has some advantages. In 2004, our country placed
28th in the exchange rate and 29th in not having any expectations for
economical downfall, and 38th in organized crimes. The mark for the
presence of scientists and architects and the level of
employee-employer relations is also high. However, there is one mark
which places Armenia above the rest: hiring foreigners, which can
probably be explained by our country’s hospitality.
It is very important to separate the activities of the government and
the private sector economies, as well as their collaboration in
different stages of economic development. What kinds of activities does
the “Economy and Values” center carry out? In order to train
specialists, the center organizes courses for “Macro-economical
Competitiveness” (prepared by Michael Porter) at the Yerevan State
University, publishes many copies for students, does research and
organizes discussions in the framework of instilling moral values in
business. The results of the WCR presented by the center will help all
links of the government and economy to formulate the right type of
strategy if, of course, government and economy evaluate the advantages
and disadvantages of Armenia’s competitiveness correctly.