FROM THE EDITOR

Jemal Inaishvili

The last month was very important and intensive in the economical life of our country.

Besides that there were changes in the economic team of our country (transferring of the Minister of Economy Alexi Alexishvili to the post of the Finance Minister and appointing of Mr. Chogovadze to the post of the Minister of Economy), the emphasis was placed on the issues concerning the growth of exporting potential of the country. The meeting of the Prime Minister of Georgia with wine-makers which was held under the aegis of the Chamber of Commerce served this purpose, and concrete ways of solving these problems were outlined there. That is why in this issue we’ll spare more attention to this subject and the external and internal steps taken by the new President of the National Bank which were followed by stopping of work of Russian banks in Abkhazia, elaboration of a new policy in relation to notorious fiscal obligations and other steps about which Roman Gotsiridze is speaking in his interview published in this issue.
This month was also very important because the last bell has rung and the new educational reform itself takes exams both in higher educational institutions and schools. Thereupon we offer you the material about the problems of economic education which is also one of the main problems now.
In this issue we offer you an exclusive material about Byelorussian economy and peculiarities of one of the strongholds of socialism, that relates about the way in which this oasis of socialism and dictatorship lives, what fate awaits Eurasia, and why they call Lukashenko “Batka” (which means “father” in Russian). It’s also important to consider the subjects concerning tea and tourism. Soon, the Chamber of Commerce is planning to hold serious conferences on these complex issues with participation of businessman, experts and scientists.
In this issue we present business proposals for investments and, as we have promised, comments on tax and accounting problems that will be useful to our producers in business management. We also present July’s business calendar and world economy review. June was a month of records on the world market, after the European constitution crisis and aggravation of the situation in Iraq and Uganda, oil prices broke a record and reached 60 USD per barrel. Our analysts will tell you about the events on both internal and world markets and about what may happen tomorrow.
And starting from this issue we will present a new format to the readers. There will be no Rusiian part in it, only Georgian and English ones will remain, so that we could give more information to investors and donors about our economy and contibute to business integration on the new markets. We hope that our readers and business will be satisfied and together we will be able to improve business and investment environment in Georgia, a little a least.
Jemal Inaishvili