Wednesday, 23 March 2011
Draft territorial development concept submitted
Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan participated in the presentation of the draft of Armenia’s territorial development concept. The ceremony was attended by Vice Prime Minister Armen Gevorgyan, head of the United Nations Armenia Office Dafina Gercheva, marz governors, civil society representatives, local and international experts.
Greeting those present, the Prime Minister noted that harmonious territorial development is a government priority considering that the over-centralization of political, administrative, economic, social and cultural functions in Yerevan is a major impediment to development as a whole. In this context, the head of government singled out 3 main problems addressed in the concept: selection of a toolkit for the monitoring of the situation in the provinces, definition of criteria for assessment of policy effectiveness and design of a simulation-based model for the planning of medium-term public expenditures.
Speaking about the need of ensuring harmonious territorial development in Armenia, the Prime Minister stated in part: “This year we extended 10 billion drams to the provinces so that they could address their welfare problems. This sum will help them cope with development inequalities. In this respect, we deem it expedient to apply the following approach based on international experience: a special fund has to be established to provide for proportionate territorial development through a set of objective criteria. Territorial development-targeted appropriations are going to be carried out based on this very approach.
Speaking about the effectiveness of government activities as assessed by means of an independent entity-conducted public opinion poll, Tigran Sargsyan said that polls help expose public opinion on government’s efforts and take note of those problems available in marzes: “The findings of those reports are discussed during the cabinet sittings held outside the capital. They expose the population’s concerns and the achievements of specific marzes.” Note that the above-stated reports, as well as the government’s shortcomings and achievements are provided on the government’s official website: www.gov.am.
Armenia’s draft territorial development concept has been designed by the Ministry of Territorial Development in cooperation with the UNDP Armenia office.
The paper features generalized marz-sensitive indices and approaches to assess the impact of development projects and investments on the social-economic status of individual communities and marzes. The above-stated methodology will help assess their influence on local performances and on the overall pattern of territorial development.
