Foreign Investments in Armenia Increase 32%

Well, we wanted some good news, and here it is!

Armenian national statistical service (Armstat) said the volume of foreign investments in the country's real economy sector in January-September of 2006 (not counting investments in the state management and banking sectors) rose almost 32 percent from a year ago to $297.5 million.

Armstat said the volume of direct investments was $149.4 million, 8 percent up from a year ago. It said investments from Greece declined 34 percent to $44.8 million, investments from Russia declined 5 percent to $34.4 million. Instead investments from Argentine grew 9 times to $58 million, 2 times from Lebanon to $56.2 million.

Investments from the USA and Great Britain made $17.6 and $21.1 million respectively, up 42 and 15 percent. Investments came also for the first time from China, Liechtenstein and Finland. Almost 34 percent of foreign and 23.7 percent of direct investments went to the communications sector, 23 percent of direct investments went to the mining and 16.4 percent to aviation sectors.

As long as these numbers don't hide a certain truth of fudging, this really is good news for Armenia. As reported earlier, this most likely means more Armenian assets are going to foreign companies/governments, which essentially means Armenains can't control their future. International conflicts and other such economic disturbances can possibly play havoc on Armenia's economy.

But since we're still growing rapidly, maybe this "initial wave" of investments - some 15 years in the making - is a good thing.

Source: ArmenPress.