Azernews.Az

By Amina Nazarli

The State Committee for Standardization, Metrology and Patent has prepared a list of the enterprises to be privatized, as part of the country’s anti-crisis actions of switching into the strict regime of savings for the next four years.

Head of the Committee Ramiz Hasanov said that enterprises not tied to the state and those directly related to the market will be privatized.

“This will be the enterprises issuing certificates, conducting calibration in the field of metrology and others," Hasanov said.

Today, the government carries out control over certification, but issues them as well. "That’s why we suggested to privatize these bodies. Proposals were sent to the parliament and were supported at the state level. Appropriate changes were made to the legislation, and we are now ready for the privatization of these enterprises,” he added.

Head of the Committee noted that the government does not intend to engage in services sphere, and for the development of small and medium-sized businesses, these areas should be privatized and handed over to the market.

Earlier this year President Ilham Aliyev noted the need to prepare a broad program of privatization, attracting both foreign and local investors, to improve the business environment and to accelerate business.

Both local and foreign investors can participate in the projects, targeting to increase the state budget revenues.

Some countries including Turkey are interested in participating in the privatization of state property in Azerbaijan.

Last year, 685 small state enterprises and objects, unfinished buildings, vehicles, 456 land plots, and 20 joint stock companies have been privatized. Moreover, 464 non-residential area and 298 plots of land were leased and five state-owned enterprises were privatized through investment competitions.

Today, there are still a sufficient number of businesses in Azerbaijan that are entirely on the state balance sheet.

Health facilities are among the state-owned companies. Deputy Prime Minister Ali Ahmadov announced earlier that most of the medical institutions in the county could be privatized in the future.

There are many fields where privatization can take place including energy sector, as well as oil and gas sectors

The process of privatization is not the guarantee of the economic revival, but it strengthens the competitiveness of the economic sphere, which includes a combination of private and public ownership.

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Amina Nazarli is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @amina_nazarli

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