Press Review 02/12/2016

The Azerbaijan-Belarus relations, the problems with state budget revenues, the situation in the real estate market, and the low level of the average monthly salary are the leading topics of today's press.

The Azerbaijan newspaper writes about the relations between Azerbaijan and Belarus. The author recalls that relations between the two countries began to develop in all fields since Heydar Aliyev came to power in 1993. The article refers to the recent visit of President Lukashenko to Azerbaijan, his meetings in Azerbaijan, and the data on the turnover and other parameters of the bilateral economic cooperation.

The website Azadliq.info asks the question of how the next year's budget will be formed on the background of financial problems, and discusses the matter with the expert Nemat Aliyev, who finds difficulty in shaping the budget. The expert blames appropriate structures that instead of forming a system of healthy competition they are engaged in speculative trading in dollars. He predicts that in 2017 revenues will decline sharply.

Echo has published an article titled Apartments in Baku Empty, House Prices Going Up. The economic problems in the country will inevitably lead to a reduction in purchasing power. The result of this state of affairs and the consequent stagnation in the real estate market was the fall in prices per square meter. Since the beginning of the economic crisis, the number of apartments sold has decreased, and construction companies raise their prices in order to thus compensate for their losses. Most of the population simply cannot afford to buy housing. According to the World Bank's analytical material related to Azerbaijan, we have the number of finished apartments three times the demand for housing, so we have so many unoccupied flats and unfinished buildings, which are not connected to communications.

Novoye Vremya has published an article entitled I Want to Live and Not Survive. According to the International Labor Organization, the average salary in Azerbaijan is one of the lowest among the 71 countries for which data are available. The highest average wage in Luxembourg is 3,722 dollars a month. Azerbaijan is at one of the last places with an average salary of 303 dollars, behind Georgia, which ranks 55^th place with 430 dollars. The problem is that our prices are also too high. It is unclear how wages can keep up with these prices. For example, in Georgia, the price of food and clothing is lower than in Azerbaijan. It means that for Georgian citizens with their average salary it is a bit easier to live. As for average salaries, pensions and social benefits, it is necessary to create conditions under which state employees, retirees, youth and other segments of the population will live, and not survive.   -0-