Media Review October 17, 2019

Socio-economic indicators over the past 9 months, millions of projects that have not justified themselves, and the level of inflation in the country are the topics of today's media.

AZƏRTAC writes about the meeting held on October 15 with the participation of President Ilham Aliyev over the results of 9 months. According to indicators, economic growth in the non-oil sector amounted to more than 3%, in the non-oil industry more than 15%, in agriculture more than 7%, inflation a little more than 2%. The President emphasized that there is tax evasion in the private sector, which is unacceptable and punishable. The head of state also touched upon the issue of overstating prices for the work done, during the checks all these facts are revealed, and this will be suppressed and punished.

The website Aktual.info writes about the profitability of state projects. In particular, we are talking about a high-speed train Baku-Ganja, which operates at a loss. This project was launched in 2018. The cost of tickets for standard passengers is 15 manat, for business class - 50 manat, for first-class passengers - 100 manat.

This train travels 234 km in 4 hours 28 minutes. Subsequently, prices changed by 10, 25 and 100 manat, respectively. Nevertheless, passengers continued to give preference to a taxi, because it is both cheaper and faster.

The author believes that AzR should take into account the interests of all sectors of society, otherwise the high-speed train will not stand the competition, if we also take into account that night intercity buses are resumed.

The Yeni Sabah.az website discusses inflation situation. The International Monetary Fund forecasted in 2019 at

Azerbaijan, the inflation rate of 2.8%, in 2020-2024 at the level of 3%.

But the IMF also compiles its data on the basis of the data of the State Statistics Committee, however, they are incorrect, because the rules for calculating inflation in Azerbaijan are erroneous, indicators are set incorrectly.

There are no alternative sources besides the State Statistics Committee. In recent months, inflation in official figures is indicated at the level of 2-3%. Experts also predicted in which areas there will be a rise in prices.