The FINANCIAL — The Tbilisi Real Estate and Retail Market Conference was held in the capital last week.
The event was organized by Tbilisi City Hall in partnership with the Ministry of Economy of Georgia, Georgian National Investment Agency, Jones Lang LaSalle and IPM.
Within the frames of the Annual Local Economic Development Forum (LED), initiated by Tbilisi City Hall, various events and initiatives are undertaken by Tbilisi City Hall in order to provide cross border communication, to share practice and experience and to set future goals and objectives for sustainable economic development.
At the conference there was a presentation and discussion of Georgian Real Estate Market Research – GREMO, the latest incentives and opportunities present on the real estate market of Georgian cities and the retail market of Tbilisi.
Georgia has great potential in the industrial and logistics as well as big box retail markets, according to a survey which was conducted by Jones Lang LaSalle and IPM.
“This conference brought together local and international players already active on the market, some potential new entrants and the local government,” said Omar Choudhury, Associate Director of Jones Lang LaSalle. “It is a good platform to discuss the best investment opportunities and start new cooperations to realize them,” he added.
“The conference provided an excellent opportunity for sharing experience, knowledge, approaches and solutions in regard to investing in Georgia. The conference was attended by local real estate, legal and financial consultants, foreign and Georgian brand retailers, potential business partners, real estate owners and other interested stakeholders,” said Konstantine Gabrichidze, Manager of Real Estate Research at IPM.
“The idea of holding the conference first came up six months ago. After doing a survey of six different sectors by Jones Lang Lasalle and IPM we thought of organising a conference in order to present the findings to society. We introduced the results of the real estate market, hotel market, industrial market, office market, residential and retail markets. This survey and the conference might help attract some new investments and investors to Georgia,” Gabrichidze said.
“Such surveys should be carried out constantly in all countries in order to control and introduce businesses and ongoing government tendencies of business for the planning of future activities,” Gabrichidze stated.
According to Zviad Archuadze, Head of the Economic Affairs office at the Municipality of Tbilisi, the conference which was held over two days, involved discussing investment opportunities existing on the Georgian real estate market and especially in retail and logistics.
“Jones Lang Lasalle is one of the biggest research companies in the world. The survey has shown that the real estate market is developing in Georgia in a very interesting way. It has already overcome the crisis since the year 2010 and is growing upwards,” Archuadze said.
“We wanted local businesses to change their opinions amongst each other about real estate. At the same time there was a discussion about the franchises and brands which have the aim to enter the Georgian market, not only in regard to retail but in many different fields. The day of the conference was dedicated to the logistics market which is connected to retail. Serious retailers can’t do their job without logistics and logistics isn’t developed without retail. It was an interesting discussion and I think many investors will now get to know Georgia as a place to invest,” Archuadze told The FINANCIAL.
“The conference was therefore attended by those foreign company representatives who are searching for partners in Georgia to invest with. We are expecting one large retailer which is very interested in entering the Georgian market. Those companies who are already represented on the market but plan to expand, also attended the conference,” Archuazde said.
“CBD Development Group has a very interesting project in Georgia’s East Gate shopping centre. So I think it was important to share with the group what the opportunities that we see are, and what we are doing. I have seen the results of the survey. I think that there is a lot of opportunity in Georgia as a developing country. Our group has a residential project in Tbilisi as well and I think that we will have much more projects in the future,” said Tim Wilkinson, Commercial Director, East Gate Shopping Village.
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