APRC conducted a Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA) on insurance reform in Georgia and provided recommendations on policy options for developing a sustainable agricultural insurance market in the country.

There are clear expectations in many cultures to marry somebody from their own group, and not living up to these expectations will at least cause a loss in reputation. This is nicely displayed in the movie Late Marriage by Dover Kosashvili, humorously depicting a young Georgian Jew in Israel whose parents want him to marry the “right” woman (the movie features extensive dialogues in Judeao-Georgian, another endangered language).

In 1122, King David IV. reconquered Tbilisi from the Muslims. In those times, a bloodbath among the former oppressors would have been the logical consequence of such a victory. Leaders of the High Middle Ages took merciless revenge against their enemies once they had defeated them. Yet David did not! On the contrary, he did not only let the former rulers live, but David was even anxious that the Muslim population might leave Tbilisi after the fall of the city.

Nodar Dumbadze has a reputation for bringing tears and laughs out of his readers. Yet, when watching his “Hellados” performed in the tiny municipal “Culture House” in Terjola, we were laughing and crying not only in appreciation of Dumbadze's rare ability to weave tragedy and comedy into a single narrative. We were certainly moved by Dumbadze’s story of teenagers growing up in the tough multiethnic environment of Sukhumi, the love-hate relationship between the Georgian Jemal and the Greek Ianguli, and their ultimate love for their homeland.

In a sense, life was relatively simple back in the Soviet Union days. Consumers had few choices, and material aspirations were limited to the unholy trinity of “apartment, car, and dacha”. That said, homo Sovieticus spent enormous amounts of time and energy chasing material goods ranging from potatoes to nylon stockings and cars.