On 19 June ISET hosted Jacques Fleury, formerly the CEO of GGMW and currently the CEO of GWS and Director of JSC Château Mukhrani. The format of the meeting was very different from the typical seminars conducted at ISET. Mr. Fleury provided insights into doing business in Georgia since 1997 when he was asked to become the CEO and increase the value of one of Georgia’s most famous intangible assets – the popularity of the mineral water from the springs of the Borjomi valley.

Regional development policy, defined as aid and assistance given to economically less developed regions, is an issue for almost every country that seeks territorial unity. Putting the arguments of equity or efficiency aside, states with high regional disparities are potentially exposed to the political risk of disintegration.

As Stephen Dowling put it in his BBC News article a few years ago, “when it comes to crossing the road, there's no such thing as an international standard. Every country does it differently.” How people drive and cross the road, according to Dowling, is a matter of a country’s cultural values. Is it really?

Does Georgia have a well-developed financial sector? Certainly, the proliferation of bank branches and automated teller machines in the capital city of Tbilisi might suggest that it does. And yet, the data indicates that for a country of its size, Georgia has a relatively small financial sector.

Recently, we discussed the low ranking of Georgia when it comes to social capital (“Since When Do Georgians Trust Banks More Than Friends?”). In the 2012 Legatum Prosperity Index, our country ranked #140 in the social capital subindex, out of 142 surveyed countries!