Armenian Scientific Cooperation

WORLD BANK ARMENIA

Essay Competition

“ARMENIA-EFFECTIVE ROADTO RECOVERY”

1st prize winners Venera Martirosyan , Armine Babakhanyan and Evelina Beknazaryan  (American University of Armenia, Business Administration, 2nd year Masters)

Year 2016. World Economic Forum. The “Annual Meeting of the New Champions” takes place in China. One of the “champions” of the year is Armenia, a small country that recorded the most effective and shortest path to recovery from 2008 financial crisis. The Armenian President will give a speech on how once a “Ba2” rating country could, in a five-year time, slide to an “A” rating country according to Moody’s rating agency. A country where roughly every fourth person was considered to be poor (23.5% poor of which 3.1%  extremely poor) as of 2008[1] and where the GDP (PPP) per capita was estimated $5,200 according to UN data, [2] steps up on the global arena with a new Armenian Economic Miracle.

Let’s hear Mr. President’s speech.

“Ladies and gentlemen, it is my honor to be here today and also to be given the opportunity to share Armenia’s experience in overcoming the biggest crisis of the last decade. I think I will start my speech with a little arithmetical equation. What is one plus one? In school we were taught that one plus one is always two. What happens in our practice is not exactly the same. During the crisis the number of resources did not change- we neither worked less, nor had we depleted all the resources, but the truth of the school arithmetic did not simply work. As our economy demonstrated, one plus one may at times be even less than two. The ineffective use of resources brings to crisis, but the effectively used resources- to the development. This idea should underlie any actions for prosperity, development and peace. In the face of the crisis, I assembled all the bright minds of my country and challenged them with one simple question: how can we use our resources effectively? We singled out the following key questions the answer to which would assist us in elaboration of development strategy:

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