Azerbaijan, EU starts implementing Twinning project

30 September 2020 14:43 (UTC+04:00)

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By Ayya Lmahamad

The official opening of the EU-funded Twinning project for support to the State Statistics Committee and the State Tax Service under the Ministry of Economy to strengthen the collection, processing, analysis, publication and dissemination of the date in the field of business statistics took place in the format of videoconference on September 29,2020.

The project is implemented by a consortium consisting of the Statistics Office of Finland, the Statistics Department of Lithuania and the Central Statistics Office of the Netherlands.

The main beneficiary organizations are the State Statistics Committee of Azerbaijan and the State Tax Service under the Azerbaijan’s Economy Ministry.

The overall goal of the 17-months Twinning project is to build the capacity of local professionals to collect, process, analyze, publish and disseminate information on private sector, small and medium business activities in Azerbaijan.

Moreover, the project includes missions aimed at improving the statistical registers of enterprises and increasing the capacity of the State Statistics Committee and the State Tax Service to bring business statistics methodology in line with EU standards, taking into account the needs of business statistics users.

Twinning is a long-term institution-building instrument supporting partner countries through institutional cooperation, acquiring the necessary skills and expertise to approximate EU legislation. Countries covered are Algeria, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Egypt, Georgia, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Moldova, Morocco, Tunisia and Ukraine.

It should be noted that EU relations with Azerbaijan are based on the EU-Azerbaijan Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (in force since 1999), which has focused on boosting trade and investment, and enhancing economic, legislative, and cultural cooperation. The European Union is the biggest trade partner of Azerbaijan and is also the biggest investor in the country (with nearly €7 billion of direct investment).

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