Tuesday, 23 February 2010
Discussions of Armenia’s 2010-2020 sustainable agricultural development strategy kicked off
Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan called a consultative meeting to discuss the draft RA 2010-2020 strategy for sustainable development of agriculture and its implementation action plan. In attendance were experts and members of the Public Council.
Before proceeding to the agenda, Tigran Sargsyan said that the draft 2010-2020 sustainable agricultural development strategy is coming under discussion: “Large-scale discussions are going to be held to get the opinion of our best experts and those professional organizations engaged in the farming sector. There are several non-governmental organizations dealing with agricultural development problems, as well as international organizations assisting the government in its farming development efforts. Therefore, we will be holding stakeholder debates so as to get full idea of the state of affairs in this area, identify the strategic areas, our assets and weaknesses, as well as to screen the resources actually available in this field.”
The Prime Minister further noted that the sphere is under RA President’s immediate control. Agriculture will be a priority area to the government in 2010, which means that decision-making and overall performance will be under strict public control.
The strategy development stage was presented by RA Minister of Agriculture Gerasim Alaverdyan, followed by First Deputy Minister Samvel Avetisyan’s detailed account of the key points of this paper.
RA Minister of Agriculture Gerasim Alaverdyan assured the head of government that the strategy meets the goals set out in the government’s sustainable development program providing for furtherance of the agrarian reform in the Republic and reduction of rural poverty.
The meeting participants came up with numerous proposals and recommendations which will be summed up during another such meeting for inclusion into the strategic paper.
