ISET’s Policy Institute is proud to announce the unveiling of its Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA) Manual. The ISET Director, Tamar Sulukhia, introduced a presentation of the work, where she thanked governmental and donor initiatives alongside USAID for all the assistance provided during the process.

Tamar Sulukhia, the ISET Director, and Gogita Todradze, the Director of GeoStat, have recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding between the International School of Economics at TSU (ISET), ISET’s Policy Institute, and the National Statistics Office of Georgia.

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed our lives and perceptions in many important ways: the value we put on face-to-face interactions, the importance of personal space, communication with loved ones, and much more. Some of these perceptions and social changes may actually outlive the pandemic.

The CCI deteriorated in March. We had hoped that the recovery of the Consumer Confidence Index, observed since December 2020, would bring the Index back to the levels observed last summer. Unfortunately, the trend reversed in March and the CCI decreased, from -35.5 in February to -39.0 in March.

On 29 December 2020, the parliament of Georgia approved the state budget for 2021, which includes allocations of around 18.3 billion GEL. From which the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Agriculture (MEPA) will receive 451.6 million (2.5% of the total budget allocation). MEPA will direct 10 mln. GEL towards the Environmental Protection and Agriculture Development Program (2.2% of MEPA’s total budget), with around 389.6 mln. (86.3% of MEPA’s total budget) to be allocated to agricultural development, and approximately 51.9 mln. GEL (11.5%) to be spent on environmental protection.