Government’s Anti-crisis Plan
How the business sector is enduring the new reality and how the public and private sectors are assisting the business sector – In their interview for Business Partner, the Prime Minister’s economic advisor Beka Liluashvili and Bank of Georgia deputy director general Levan Kulijanashvili have discussed and analyzed the mentioned issues.
As noted by Beka Liluashvili, the Government has been developing a post-crisis program with the participation of business and international and domestic experts.
“Amid the current epidemiological challenges, the anti-crisis plan enables to maximally assist both our citizens and entrepreneurs to maintain more job places. Besides this plan, we are also developing a post-crisis economic program to simulate the private sector, implement economic projects and expand economic activities, create more job places in the post-pandemic period.
Our key objective is to maintain job places. The Government will pay compensations to those in unpaid leaves or whose labor agreements were suspended or terminated. Regretfully, some irresponsible business companies “managed” and gave unpaid leaves to employees and revised their labor agreements”, Beka Liluashvili said.
There are also companies that have demonstrated the high social responsibility and maintain employees and pay their salaries too, he added.
“Some companies released statements that financial resources accumulated as a result of incomes tax exempt would be used for growing staff salaries. This is our reality today and we also have many business companies with the sense of responsibility, as well as other part of business companies, which, regretfully, have to take undesirable decisions to rescue their businesses”, Beka Liluashvili noted and added that the Government is doing its best, particularly at the state-owned entities to maintain job places and assist our citizens.
“Today we are facing the sharpest and major challenge and it is not expedient to differentiate public and private sector in this regard. Today, each job place that is created or exists in the country is the guarantee that people will deliver salaries to their families and satisfy their needs and this is critically important”, Beka Liluashvili noted.
As for Bank of Georgia deputy director general Levan Kulijanashvili, he has positively appraised the Government’s cooperation with foreign donor organizations and stressed the importance of partnership between Bank of Georgia and the private sector.
“In the shortest period, the Georgian Authorities have contracted international financial assistance programs of 3 billion USD. The anti-crisis program valuably responds to all challenges today.
We, as the financial institution, believe that the further development will be very interesting and it will affect various economic fields. From the very beginning, our key objective was to shape healthy and safe environment in the country.
We intensified consultations with our clients (consumers) so as they use distant channels more frequently. We have voiced several initiatives and today our clients are able to use all mobile banking services free of charge.
We have several offers for the private sector that enable them to digitize the supply channels. We conduct webinars twice a week and hold consultations. Several platforms were created, including Adapter.ge that enables the private sector to arrange a special digital store”, Levan Kulijanashvili noted.