Azerbaijan's economy proved its stability – minister
By Sara Rajabova
Non-oil sector of the Azerbaijani economy showed a growth at level of 10.9 percent in the first half of 2013, providing a five percent growth of the entire economy of Azerbaijan as a whole, Minister of Finance Samir Sharifov said at a meeting of the Cabinet of Ministers, dedicated to the socio-economic development in the first half of 2013 and the upcoming challenges on July 18.
"Despite the improving forecasts for an accelerated pullout of the world economy from a deep financial and economic turn-down in the first half of 2013, the trend towards the revival is still not strong enough. The majority of the developed countries, particularly the countries of the Eurozone, should pass a long and difficult way to the complete restoration. The developing countries are faced with the economic slowdown. These factors contributed to the revision of the global economic outlook of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank (WB) for 2013 towards downwards," Sharifov said.
According to the minister, in the first half of 2013 on the backdrop of the global economic crisis, Azerbaijan's economy has once again shown its stability and high growth potential.
"The continued growth of non-oil sector of the economy in the last three years and overcoming the bar of 10 percent should be assessed as a result of successful implementation of the model of economic development of the country aimed at modernizing and branching of the Azerbaijani economy, reducing dependence on the oil factor and the accelerated development of non-oil sector," Sharifov said.