On February 14, Prof. Muhammad Asali delivered a research seminar and presented his work on the relationship between the labor market and the healthiness of the economy. The paper, entitled “Labor Market Discrimination and the Macroeconomy,” which is a joint work with his former student Ms. Rusudan Gurashvili, aimed at measuring and documenting the discriminatory wage gaps in Georgia within gender and ethnic dimensions.

After independence from the Soviet Union, Georgia started experiencing a significant rise in the number of boys born compared with the number of girls, the sex ratio at birth. As of 2004 Georgia had one of the highest sex ratio at birth rates in the world, but by 2016 the ratio was at the biologically normal level. The country’s unique position provides valuable knowledge and experience.

Georgia has a number of laws and regulations governing water resources, dating back to the late nineties and partially amended after 2003. These changes, however, have not always followed a clear and coherent strategy. Consequently, in the words of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE), the current legislation is an “unworkable and fragmented system”.

Geostat has published its rapid estimate of real GDP growth for the fourth quarter of 2018, and their estimated growth stands at 4.8%, which is 1.1 percentage point above ISET-PI’s most recent forecast.

Dairy production in Georgia is a hot topic right now. Over the last couple of years, new state regulations have been adopted in this sector. The most widely discussed recent change in regulations prohibits the use of milk powder in cheese production. This regulation was adopted in 2015 but was amended in June of 2017 in order to better serve consumer interests.