As they say we are there. After having dual digit economic growth for years we reached the point when we get happy with the low rates of economic slump. Armenia’s GDP in January-October, 2009 slashed by 17.5% year-on-year, the country’s National Statistical Service said. Last month a recession of 18.3% was reported in Armenia. According to the official figures, in terms of money the GDP totaled 2.466 trillion Drams. In October 2009 GDP was 5.1% down from the previous month. If wished these figures can be demonstrated as positive dynamics. But it is so by only first sight. In October 2009 GDP was 5.1% down from the previous month. In January-October 2008 Armenian economy grew by 9.2 percent. For the reduction of the economic slump by 0.8% we must be thankful not to the activation of the economy during the year but to the figures of the last year. Thus, if the GDP of September 2008 grew by 2.4% compared to August, then October compared to September slumped down by 8.3%. By going forward let us mention that the indices of November of this year will be more favorable as last November was already very sad and a 30.7% plumage was registered. In a word, if the government is stipulating the bad indices of this year with the good indices of the year and was calling it a “technical recession” then by the same logic we are currently dealing with “technical activation.” But let us speak about the current macroeconomic indices. As in previous months the greatest amount of reduction is registered in the field of construction – 41.6%. Moreover, the construction is the only branch; where in the monthly cut negative dynamics was registered. If the volume of construction in September exceeded the indices of August by 26.6% then in October compared to September a 18.2% slump was registered. It is mainly the fault of the construction sector, which caused the economy negative indices in October. All the other sectors registered growth during October. Thus, in October (compared to September) the volume of industrial production grew by 5.1%, the volume of agricultural goods by 4.9% and the volume of services grew by 4.9%. Despite this all the sectors radically yield to the indices of January-October of the last year. According to the National Statistics Service, this year the recession totaled 51.6% in construction, 11.4 % in industry, 0,8% in agriculture and 1.5% in the sphere of services. A total of 83,000 Armenians were registered officially as jobless in January-October 2009. According to official figures, the number of jobless rose year-on-year by 11.4%. In October the number of unemployed people drooped by 0.1 percent from September. The average monthly salary grew by 11.5% and amounted to 98.618 AMD. Moreover, the salaries of the employees of state offices grew by 16.1% and amounted to 81.529 AMD and as of the private sector employees the salaries grew by 8.1% and amounted to 123.160 AMD. The volume of foreign trade turnover lowered by 31%, export – by 41.7% (amounting to 200.7 billion AMD or 551.6 million USD) and import – by 28.5% (amounting to 928.1 billion AMD or 2.57 billion USD). As of the exportation the negative dynamics still continues compared to the previous months. In October the slump amounted to 1.4%. So the negative balance of the foreign trade reached 724.4 billion AMD (over 2 billion USD), which makes approximately 30% of the GDP. Let us add that the government had planned a 9.2% economic growth in accordance with the budget of 2009 and after certain correctional activities they predicted a 15% slump in the GDP. And for the next year, according to the state budget 2010 a 1.2% economic growth is forecast.
