Date: 15-16 March, 2018
Venue: Business Association of Georgia office in Tbilisi
The conference was attended by heads and staff of the Secretariats of Investment Councils (ICs) of Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Armenia, Georgia, Albania, Egypt, Ukraine, Moldova, and the representatives of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
Heads of Secretariats delivered brief presentations on their achievements in 2017, and priorities for 2018. Then, Secretariats of Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Moldova made presentations on cases where ICs were successful in implementing the reforms, and cases where the work of ICs had gone off track. This sharing of knowledge and experience led to fruitful discussion among the attendees on what lessons can be learned from other ICs and how can the Secretariat strengthen their support to the Investment council.
IC Secretariats of Albania, Armenia, and Georgia made presentations on their progress in cooperation with the development partners and the private sector representatives. It was great to learn from their experience how the work of IC and Secretariat can be improvement in respect to cooperation with the development partners, embassies, and business associations.
Overall, the conference presented a unique opportunity to engage in knowledge and experience sharing with the Investment Councils of other countries, and apply the successful reforms and initiatives of other ICs in Tajikistan. In particular, IC Secretariat of Tajikistan aims adopt the success of High Technology Park (HTP) establishment in Kyrgyz Republic, and analyze HTP establishment in Tajikistan. Given the similarities in our economies, we believe HTP will also be contribution to the economic growth in Tajikistan, especially SME Development. We are also thinking of expanding the scope of our work by engaging as experts in development projects of development partners. This will take the cooperation of IC with development partners to the next level, and provide expert contribution to the development projects, as the case of Armenia has demonstrated.
Also, as we learned from the experience of Albania IC and Georgia IC, we will strengthen our work with business associations, use their expertise and resources in conducting surveys and analysis to determine the priority areas for upcoming IC Sessions.
Conclusion
Overall, the business trip to Tbilisi presented the IC Secretariat of Tajikistan a unique opportunity to learn from the experiences of the ICs of other countries, and analyze which practices could be implemented in Tajikistan to further improve the investment climate and promote Public-Private Dialogue. Since, public service improvement is on the agenda for IC of Tajikistan, sight visits to the Public Services enabled to see the work of an effective institution delivering public services, and understand the process of establishment and challenges in the way to creation of such an institution. IC Secretariat of Tajikistan aims to make full benefit of this business trip to improve its work in supporting the investment climate improvement in Tajikistan by applying the best practices of other ICs and learning from their experience.
