Georgia ranks 49th in Global Militarization Index

Georgia ranks 49th among 154 countries in the Global Militarization Index (GMI) 2019 with a score of 660.13, reads the report by the Bonn International Center for Conversion (BICC).

The Global Militarization Index expresses the relative weight and importance of the military apparatus of a country in relation to its society as a whole. 

Last year, Georgia ranked 52nd in the index. 

The first five countries in the Global Militarization Index are the following:

• Israel - 891.69 score
• Singapore - 860.53 score
• Armenia - 853.6 score
• Cyprus - 828.19 score
• Republic of Korea - 821.32 score

As for Georgia's neighbouring countries, Russia ranks 6th place with a score of 818.5, while Turkey ranks 19th with a score of 749.88.

Russia continues to sustain one of the largest military forces in the world. The European NATO countries, especially Baltic and eastern European states, are again continuing to arm themselves pointing to ongoing tensions with Russia," says the report.  

However, the report says that Russia's defence spending decreased from $82.6 billion in 2016 to $64.2 billion in 2018. The authors say that the reason is the difficult economic situation, resulting from low commodity prices and sanctions imposed by the West.

The reports read that the USA ranks 31st noting that "no other country spends as much money on its military as the United States." The reason why the USA is not among ten heavily militarised states is that it has a strong economy and spends less per cent of GDP on its military spending compared to other countries. 

Bank in September 2019 Georgian Minister of Defense Irakli Gharibashvili spoke about the main priorities of the Defence Ministry in the 2020 budget and said that the main priority is to care for Georgian soldiers and to increase the defence capability of the country.

The main focus will be on infrastructure development. My main task will be to upgrade the front as much as possible and start upgrading at almost every base – military bases, barracks, shower rooms, canteens," said Gharibashvili. 

The budget of the Ministry of Defense will be 880 million GEL ($315.4 mln/€285.9 mln) in 2020.

We will improve soldiers’ outfits, attire, shoes and more. The nutrition will become better than it is today. Physical training of the military will be continued. We also envisage a salary increase. There are several categories with salaries rising from 100 to 500 GEL by military ranks. The budget also includes improvement of insurance and conditions of the wounded and injured,” Irakli Garibashvili said.

The Global Militarization Index project is financially supported by Germany's Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development.