EU to continue support of economic diversification in Azerbaijan

Baku, September 21, AZERTAC The EU has announced a new assistance package to Azerbaijan intended to continue support of economic diversification through targeted assistance in the areas of financial, economic and judicial governance in Azerbaijan. The €13.5 million funding will focus on enhancing the competitiveness and export opportunities of small and medium-sized businesses, as well as on improving the business environment by providing assistance to key government institutions. The program, ‘Technical Cooperation Facility, will aim at enhancing the competitiveness and export performance of small and medium-sized enterprises and, as a result, strengthen the country's non-oil GDP growth and job creation. It will support modernization of institutions, as well as the regulatory and operational environment. It will focus on capacity building to further develop skills and entrepreneurship, access to finance and internationalization. The initiative will also introduce alternative means of dispute resolution which will contribute to the improvement of the business environment. In addition, it will also directly benefit citizens and in particular vulnerable groups. In addition, the program will support the improvement of the efficiency of public expenditure and revenue collection of key financial institutions in Azerbaijan, thus increasing accountability in line with EU best practices and standards. This new bilateral assistance package confirms the EU's and Azerbaijan's willingness to move forward in a number of areas of cooperation and will underpin the forthcoming negotiations of a new bilateral agreement.