The FINANCIAL — More than 1 billion USD was invested by Israeli businessmen in Georgia during the last 5 years, according to Itzhak Gerberg, Ambassador of Israel to Georgia. He says that Georgia has a lot of potential and advantages in terms of attracting investors. At the moment Israel and Georgia are about to sign an economic agreement.
“Actually the agreement will hopefully be signed in the next months. Because of some technical reasons, this agreement hasn’t yet been signed. We have to wait until government representatives visit Israel,” the Ambassador said.
“In 2009 there were fewer investments from Israel than in pervious years, but I hope that will change in the future. The Minister of Economic Development is going to Israel soon to encourage Israeli Investors,” Gerberg told The FINANCIAL.
“The bilateral relations between Georgia and Israel are excellent in all fields. We are collaborating with the Ministry of Healthcare of Georgia, and the Ministry of Agriculture. We have many tourists who are coming from Israel to Georgia. We have more than 3 direct flights per week between Tel Aviv and Tbilisi. Especially in the summer the number of tourists will be significantly increased. Hopefully the number of Israeli tourists visiting Georgia will be about 50 thousand this year.”
“There is one field which is very important and it is culture. We have cultural activities, I just agreed on bringing an Israeli performance to the International Festival of Theatre in Tbilisi in October. There are many Georgian cultural activities in Israel, with Georgian artists’ involvement. We are planning to bring Israeli artists and their work to Tbilisi.”
“We will increase the number of direct flights and I hope this will be another factor to encourage not only tourists but also investors. It’s very convenient that you can fly to Tbilisi airport, manage your business and fly back home the following day. Time is very important for business and the fact that we have direct flights between Georgia and Israel is very important for investors.”
“Of course we can still diversify export in Israel which was concentrating on wine, water and nuts. Anyway we would like to see more collaboration, more exchange of visitors and more investors coming to Georgia, especially when I understand that the tendency in Georgia is to reduce bureaucracy and make Georgia friendlier towards foreign investors.
Hopefully we will have more Israeli investors, but all in all I think that in previous years there were roughly 1 billion USD of Israeli investments put in Georgia altogether.”
Q. What could be advantageous about Georgia for Israeli Investors?
A. I think that Georgia has a lot of potential and specific advantages, especially for Israeli investors. First of all we have excellent bilateral relationship; there are many Israeli people who speak Georgian. And both countries have really excellent relations with the US.
The most important thing is that there is good will in Israel towards Georgia. During the war in Georgia, not only the Government but also the people of Israel supported Georgia and even accepted wounded soldiers for medical treatment in Israel.
Israel is a very advanced country in terms of technology and hi-tech that can be introduced in Georgia.
I know that there are several new Israeli companies that have arrived on the Georgian market, but that’s not official information, because they don’t report to us. In general I can tell you that there are new investors that have appeared in the last year, for instance Elvis restaurant, which is an Israeli company. Republic Hospital is also an Israeli project that should be privatized soon. I don’t know if an Israeli company will win the bid but the Israeli company is definitely in the short list and have a very good chance to win the bid. Recently a telecommunication company arrived here as well.
There are 3 areas that we encourage investors in. One is agricultural equipment, the second is healthcare, and the third – telecommunications. These are the three areas that Israel is very wealthy and advantageous in. We are doing even better than other big countries and those three spheres are competing with Europe and the US. Our comparative advantage is that we are geographically close, so we can provide Georgia not only with technology but also with the service to adapt the technology.”
“The best thing about Georgia is that the people are very friendly, very welcoming. Wherever I go I feel a lot of warmth towards Israel in general. Also on an individual level I feel people are very genuine and nice.”
Discussion about this post