On Tuesday, October 27th, ISET hosted Zurab Tchiaberashvili, former Mayor of Tbilisi, former Minister of Health and Social Affairs of Georgia, and current professor at Ilia State University. Mr. Tchiaberashvili delivered a presentation titled “Healthcare in Georgia: Challenges Ahead.”

This week we use the Khachapuri Index to look at Georgia’s broader economic geography. We do so on the basis of price data for more than 100 products from each and every Georgian municipality, which were collected by the Georgian government with assistance from ISET and EU’s European Neighborhood Program for Agriculture and Rural Development (ENPARD).

The objective of this activity is to design, develop and implement an operational the Georgian Reform Progress Tracking System (GRPTS) that informs grant beneficiaries on how new reform efforts of the Georgian government have progressed against their intended objectives and continue to improve development outcomes.

On August 16-22, 2015 the head of ISET-PI's Agricultural Policy Research Center (APRC), Pati Mamardashvili participated in a study tour in Switzerland, organized by the Market Opportunities for Livelihood Improvement in Kakheti (MOLI) project. Local government and private sector representatives from Kakheti were invited on the tour.

Human capital is the biggest asset of each and every think tank. In securing reliable and high-quality researchers, think tanks compete with much more powerful competitors—i.e., governments, state agencies, private companies, banks, and consulting companies. The region’s think tanks, therefore, have to devise special motivation strategies to retain existing staff and attract new talented individuals to opt for this career.