For many observers, the Georgian job market is a mystery. Companies are bitterly complaining about a lack of engineers, forcing them to withhold the expansion of production capacities and to cut down investments. Yet Georgian young people, who could make good fortunes by studying technical subjects, prefer to learn the law, business administration and the like, qualifications that are oversupplied in the market and on average do not yield high salaries.
On December 5, ISET hosted Levan Akhvlediani, General Manager of Kagri Limited, who delivered a seminar on physical commodity trading, which takes place around the world. According to Mr. Akhvlediani, being a trader is a very demanding job that carries high risk, but at the same time is very interesting.
In our last week’s article, we examined Georgia’s economic growth in the 12 months before the 2012 parliamentary elections. In particular, we reviewed the popular argument that much of this economic growth was driven by the “political business cycle” effect of public (over)spending prior to the elections.
Measuring economic developments is often a laborious business. Consider, for example, the Consumer Price Index (CPI). One first has to define the so-called consumption basket that contains the goods and services whose prices you want to track. These goods and services have to be represented in the basket in the right proportions, reflecting the consumption patterns of an average consumer.
Ukraine’s agriculture started progressing after the land reforms of 2001, which established an effective land rental market. While the titles to land still belong to former kolkhoz and sovkhoz members, agricultural land can now be easily aggregated and leased to interested businesses.