Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan with his wife Anna Hakobyan attended the opening of the 10th jubilee Festival of Rural Life and Traditions, which is being held this year in Dzoraghbyur settlement of Kotayk Province. Deputy Minister of Economy Arman Khojoyan, Governor of Kotayk Aharon Sahakyan and others were also present at the event.

Welcoming the attendees, the Prime Minister clarified why the Government is interested in such events.

"You know, in Armenia, as a rule, the word agriculture is mainly associated with the word suffering. And we constantly hear and see that our dear farmers, investing a lot of physical work and nerves, eventually face further problems and cannot get out of that cycle.

What is our policy in this area? We want to do our best so that agriculture is associated with the concepts of efficiency, well-being, aesthetics, health and a healthy lifestyle.

Such events are important for us because many countries of the world have given the answer to these questions. In the field of agriculture, although we have certain islands where these concepts are present, unfortunately, this is not yet a widespread phenomenon in the Republic of Armenia.

And with such events we try to emphasize this agenda and re-emphasize that there is nothing shameful for any of us about learning. For example, I learn all kinds of targetted things, because I know that I either don't know it, or I don't know it well. Even Socrates, one of the most famous philosophers in the history of the world, said: I know that I know nothing. There is no shame in any of us saying, I know I don't know much, and therefore if I don't know much, I am to go after that knowledge.

And the Government's goal is, firstly, to encourage this perception among our citizens, and secondly, to create opportunities, conditions, because there may be many citizens who want to fill in what they don't know, but there are no opportunities, no infrastructure, no platforms for that. And the existence of such platforms is extremely important for us. We have contradictions in the country today. On the one hand, our Agrarian University, unfortunately, is not of much interest among students, on the other hand, many of our intensive farms invite agronomists from Europe with a salary of 700-800 euros per hour, and in many cases they pay this much for online work.

I want to welcome this meeting because I also talked about health. We often fail to see the link between our population's health problems and agriculture. Look, the approach that the more fertilizer we give, the bigger and more harvest we will have, which physically can happen, but it has consequences. And in the modern world there are trends to develop organic agriculture, healthy agriculture. And food safety is also a problem for us," said the Prime Minister, adding that we have serious problems here.

According to Nikol Pashinyan, this cannot be the problem of the farmer, the citizen, the government, the opposition separately. This belongs to all of us, because that product from our markets and stores goes to everyone's homes, both oppositionists and supporters of the government, and neutrals, both politicized and non-politicized citizens. Therefore, these are global problems and our attention to them is not sufficient.

"Next, the part about suffering. it is very important that modern orchards are not only a place of work, but also a place of relaxation, because when a person sees the aesthetic image of his work, it gives him new energy, of course in combination with income. For many years, we, the Ministry of Economy, have been setting the task before our colleagues in the field of agriculture, that every farmer should know the cost price of his harvest, knows all the information. Because when it comes to procurement and we are discussing different prices, we do not know what these prices are compared to. When we have clear formulas for calculating costs, we will know whether the price offered for procurement is too much or too little, how much profit margin there is in it, how much the Government should help. And this is important for the Government, because with many of our support programs, money is spent, but we see that there are not great results from it. At the moment we are solving some problem, next year we know we will face the same problem.

Today is first of all a holiday, but a holiday is also a meeting, a holiday is also a conversation, a holiday is also an exchange of experiences. And I want to believe that with such events, our public perceptions of modern methods and forms of agriculture increase, and I attach great importance to that children see this," said Nikol Pashinyan.

The Prime Minister added that schoolchildren should be involved in the improvement of the land, which should not only be cultivated, but cultivated with modern knowledge, so that it is not an exploitation of the child's physical strength, but also a process of preparing the child for his future life. "After all, they study botany in schools. We also create small greenhouss in schools.

This is a very important direction, because intensive agriculture is not only about cultivating the land, it is about ways of thinking. We should not change our ways of thinking, but update them, because the world is changing. Thinking is also a program.

I congratulate all of us and wish all farms and farmers of Armenia more and more abundant harvests and productive work," said the Prime Minister.

The goal of the annual Rural Live festival is to contribute to the development of sustainable agriculture and rural communities in Armenia through positive change.

The festival is a unique platform where farmers, producers, processors, buyers and various organizations and potential investors meet to share experiences, collaborate and find new markets. Around 200 farmers and farmer groups participate in the festival every year.

The festival is accompanied by a traditional concert program with the participation of folk singers, musicians and small cultural groups.