Development of a Regional Investment Profile for the Samtskhe-Javakheti Region of Georgia

As one of the main tools for expedient investment promotion, GNIA has developed Georgia’s investment profile. Georgia’s profile considers the key informational recommendations by international agencies (e.g. World Bank, OECD, UNCTAD, MIGA, etc.) and provides detailed information such as: key performance indicators; main facts and figures; investment opportunities; the country’s advantages; etc. By using and constantly developing this tool, GNIA aims to:

• Attract the investors (both domestic and foreign).
• Provide preliminary detailed information on Georgia’s investment opportunities and local business environment.
• Promote investment linkages.
• Encourage investment incentives.
• Strengthen the local investment image.

Although GNIA has developed the country’s profile, from a regional perspective there remains an informational gap which could hinder investment in specific regions of the country. Therefore, similar to the country’s profile, regional investment profile will ‘zoom-in’ the interests of potential investors to regional advantages and investment opportunities.

To launch a development of regional investment profiles, GNIA contracted PMCG (Prime Contractor) and Booz Allen Hamilton (sub-contractor). By developing the regional profile, the following advantages was aimed to be achieved: a wide audience can access the regional context information; regional image better presented; regional investment incentives can be generated and general customer/competitor information explored; investment opportunity targets can be explored in a region and its main attractive sectors/projects. Therefore domestic and foreign investors will have the opportunity to not only access general information about investing in the country, but will also have a more in-depth grasp of the regional environment and possibilities. This could simplify the investment generation tasks of particular regions, and ultimately the whole of Georgia.

Regional investment profile can give investors the opportunity to: access detailed information on key regional development trends; review and analyze the regional principal industrial and business sectors; make comparative analysis with other regions; identify the key investment opportunities by sectors; scrutinize the regional economic potential and development perspectives; and generally gather a clear picture of the main determinants of investing in specific regions.

At the first stage, in order to examine the clear benefits and value of the development of such regional profiles, a pilot project for one particular region should be conducted. The proposed experimental region, for development of its regional investment profile is Samtskhe-Javakheti. The project is intended to be finalized by the end of August 2012. This profile is intended to act as the model for other future regional profiles to follow.

The overall purpose of the assignment is to support and facilitate investment in the regions of Georgia in general and in Samtskhe-Javakheti region in particular by developing a comprehensive, practical and applicable investment profile.

Objectives of the Project:

• Elaborate the methodology of the study
• Develop the investment profile, including but not limited to:

• • Overview of region

• • Major economic trends and tendencies;

• • Socio-demographic analysis;

• • Economic potential

• • Development perspectives;

• • Other information useful for generating investments