Armenia Must Build a Diversified Investment Environment: Deputy Prime Minister

Deputy Prime Minister Mher Grigoryan stated during a panel discussion at the first conference of representatives from Armenian state bodies that he is somewhat skeptical about dividing investments by regions, as the current investment environment is the internet.

“This is already one of our fundamental strategic issues that we will continue to address. We must redefine and understand what investment means for us; we should no longer treat investment as a traditional process where someone buys a ticket, flies to Armenia with a suitcase and some resources, and tries to build a factory. There is no such thing today; the investment process has changed. Today's investments are diversified, small shares that circulate according to stock market rules and, ideally, also in international markets. The buyer is acquiring it as a small share of idea X, company X, or startup X,” he emphasized.

According to Grigoryan, our businesses need to learn how to tell their stories: “This is a business rule that, unfortunately, is not well developed in Armenia, and we must do everything we can to enhance it. In this case, I assure you that the potential pool of investors will not only enlarge locally but will become a vast global one because billions of people and tens of millions of companies around the world want to invest, yet we fail to tell them about ourselves. In this sense, the potential pool of investments and investors is significantly shrinking and narrowing.”