Georgia, Austria agree to strengthen economic cooperation
Georgian Deputy Economy Minister, Genadi Arveladze, and Florian Fischer, Director General of the Economic, Innovation and International Policy Department of the Austrian Federal Ministry for Economic and Digital Affairs. Photo: Ministry of Economy.
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Georgia and Austria are strengthening economic cooperation and deepening ties in the fields of trade and investment, digitization, communications and innovation, transport, energy, tourism, agriculture and the environment, the Ministry of Economy of Georgia has announced.
The decision was made at the 6th Session of the Georgia-Austria Joint Intergovernmental Commission on Economic Cooperation, held in Vienna yesterday.
The meeting was chaired by Georgian Deputy Economy Minister, Genadi Arveladze, and Florian Fischer, Director General of the Economic, Innovation and International Policy Department of the Austrian Federal Ministry for Economic and Digital Affairs.
At the meeting, Fischer said that Austrian companies are showing interest in Georgia's energy, education, agriculture and transport fields.
The Georgian Ministry of Economy reports that in the first eight months of 2021, Georgia increased its exports to Austria by 5%.
The Georgian-Austrian Business Forum was also held as part of the intergovernmental commission meeting, in which about ten Georgian companies took part.
Arveladze said that as of today there are more than 190 companies operating in Georgia with Austrian capital.
Austrian President Alexander van der Bellen says economic relations with Georgia are good nowadays, but they have ‘great potential to be intensified’. In his opening remarks at the Austria-Georgia business forum held in Vienna earlier today, President van der Bellen also noted that after the difficulties caused by the pandemic, the Georgian economy ‘has picked up speed again very quickly'.
Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili has paid a historic official visit to Austria. She is the first Georgia president to visit the country in an official capacity for the first time in 100 years. Zurabishvili met with Austrian President Alexander van der Bellen earlier today, after meeting with members of the Georgian diaspora in Vienna.
Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili has met with members of the Georgian diaspora in Vienna during her recent visit to Austria, where she stated that culture is one of Georgia’s key resources and it needs to be popularised.
Georgian Parliament Speaker Kakha Kuchava has left for Ukraine on an official visit today. As part of his official visit to Ukraine, Kakha Kuchava will take part in the ceremony in Babin Yar, Kyiv, to pay tribute to the memory of the victims of the Holocaust in Ukraine.
Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili, who is on her historic visit to Austria, spoke about the situation in Georgia’s Russian-occupied regions as well as the importance of women’s empowerment with the OSCE Secretary General Hekga Schmid.
Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili has met the Austrian Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg in Glasgow on the sidelines of the 26th UN Climate Change Conference where they discussed the importance of further deepening of trade-economic ties between the two countries.
The importance of Austria's support for Georgia on the latter’s European and Euro-Atlantic integration path, and a further deepening of the partnership between the two states were discussed by Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili and Karl Nehammer, the Austrian Chancellor, in a call on Friday.