A regular Cabinet meeting took place today, chaired by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.

The draft law of the Republic of Armenia on amendments and additions to the law "On Military Service and the Status of Servicemen" was approved at the Cabinet meeting.

In connection with that, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said, “This project is part of the reform package of the Armed Forces, Army, and what does this say in essence? After six months of mandatory service, the soldiers can sign military service contract, i.e. serve and receive a salary, provided that they will already become a contract soldier and the term of the contract with them will be set for 5 years.

I want to emphasize that this is one of the steps of the transition to the professional army, because now at this stage, those conscripts who want to shift to professional service, will have this opportunity at least for a term of 5 years due to this change in the law”.

By the Government decision, the list of the most dangerous schools from a seismic point of view, included in the seismic safety improvement program, will be clarified. In this regard, the schools that have already been built, reconstructed, overhauled or are in the process of construction funded by Republic of Armenia state budget, the Asian Development Bank and the World Bank, were presented in a separate appendix to the project. The change is due to the proposal submitted by the ADB.

According to the Government's decision, the expenses of autumn wheat cultivation will be partially reimbursed to the farmers cultivating wheat fields with an area of up to 100 hectares. The program envisages partial reimbursement (about 50%) of the costs of autumn wheat cultivation to farmers cultivating wheat fields up to 100 ha in all provinces of Armenia, except for Armavir and Ararat provinces, in particular, in the case of sowing with certified seeds, the estimated costs of purchasing seeds, fertilizer and diesel fuel will be reinbursed, and in the case of non-certified seeds, only fertilizer and diesel fuel will be reinbursed.

Referring to the topic, the Prime Minister noted that despite the economic indicators, the dynamics of decline continues in the agricultural sector. "But the overall economic situation in our country is good, and in September 2022 we recorded an economic activity index of 14.6 percent, and in January-September 2022, we have an increase of 14.1 percent compared to January-September 2021. Moreover, the volume of industrial output increased by 10 percent, agriculture is the only sector where we still have a decline, the volume of construction increased by 14.3 percent, trade turnover increased by 14.5 percent, the volume of services - 27.1 percent, the volume of electricity production - 16.9 percent, in the export sector we have an increase of 63.8 percent, we have an increase of 61.6 percent in the import sector”.

The Government approved the proposal to sign the loan agreement between the Republic of Armenia and the Asian Development Bank "Fiscal stability and financial markets development program". The budgetary support funds will be directed to the financing of the deficit defined by the Republic of Armenia Law "On the State Budget of the Republic of Armenia 2022", therefore the timely receipt of credit funds is of great importance from the point of view of financing the expenses provided by the state budget categories.