In the Government, Whatever Program is Discussed, You Understand There is No Program Underneath: B. Pipoyan

There are undoubtedly significant losses in the agricultural sector, but we need to translate this into numbers. This was stated by Babken Pipoyan, the president of the NGO 'Informed and Protected Consumer', in an interview with Tert.am, addressing the losses in agriculture.

“We need to clearly distinguish what portion of the lost land consists of land used for forage crops, what the volumes of lost fruit orchards are, and what unique grape varieties we have that cannot be restored,” he said, adding that the organizations responsible for these assessments have not fulfilled their duties.

“Day by day, arable lands are changing, and in some villages of the Syunik region, pastures will no longer be cultivated for livestock farming. Figuratively speaking, if a doctor sees that a patient has a headache, they may give painkillers for one day, but if the headache is persistent, continually administering painkillers may worsen the situation, so a proper diagnosis must first be made. As a state, we need to accurately assess the extent of our losses and their impact on the overall sector before developing appropriate measures,” he said, mentioning that while there are things we can replace, some cannot be quickly substituted.

Commenting on the Minister of Economy’s statement that chicken meat prices will rise by 80 percent and that Armenia offers a good investment environment for chicken production, Babken Pipoyan assured that this has no relation to reality and clarified, “In fact, the price of chicken imported from third countries is rising, but there is no price change when it comes to imports from EAEU countries.” He also noted that this statement results from incorrect calculations and misleads the public.

Pipoyan cited the development of the poultry market in Russia as an example, mentioning that state programs have been implemented there, and if our local fresh chicken provides competitiveness due to its freshness, then frozen chicken cannot maintain competitiveness.

Discussing the overall inflation, he observed that almost everything could become more expensive. “Production volumes are decreasing, demand is increasing, and those products will rise in price until the gap is filled. The government’s actions do not correspond to solving the existing problems; whatever program is discussed, it is clear that there is simply no program underneath,” he said.

Pipoyan noted that while a normal economy can handle an inflation rate of up to 4%, allowing the state to breathe, in Armenia, this is a nightmare as people's incomes are not rising, with a decrease in income expected.