The Agricultural Policy Research Center (APRC) of the ISET Policy Institute has launched a new monthly analytical publication – the Agri Review. The goal of the publication is to summarize the major economic developments in the agricultural sector and provide a brief analysis of major economic indicators.

This research aims to explain how Georgia’s economic development in the past 12-15 years took place despite the absence of rural-urban migration, defying the predictions of the Lewis Model - one of the most influential theories in development economics.

On June 7, during his visit to Georgia, Mr. Anthony De Lannoy, the Executive Director of the IMF who represents Georgia along with the other 15 countries at the IMF Board of Directors, addressed an audience of ISET researchers, students, and management, as well as senior representatives of the National Bank of Georgia, with an overview of the IMF and its cooperation with Georgia.

As economic development progresses, air pollution and the lack of green spaces have become increasingly painful issues for Tbilisi citizens. In our previous blog, Breathing in Tbilisi, we discussed the negative outcomes – in terms of air pollution and tree-cutting – generated by the actions of self-interested developers facing an inert civil society and a local government that is unwilling and/or unable to protect the green public spaces.

Structural transformation of the economy is one of the most important determinants of economic development. Almost invariably, nations that have managed to pull themselves out of poverty were able to diversify their economies away from low productivity sectors. In advanced countries, productivity differences between sectors are generally small, and growth mostly happens because of productivity improvements within sectors.