Today, high-ranking officials from the Finance Ministry and representatives of public and business organizations dealing with business and consumer rights discussed today's issues that exist in the field and proposals for their solution at the coffee table in a tie-free and relaxed atmosphere

The RA Deputy Minister of Finance Mr. Karen Tamazyan and Mr. Sergey Shahnazaryan, the Head of Financial Management and Control Methodology Division of the RA Ministry of Finances participated in the meeting as well.

The event was organized in the scope of the “Evidence-based Advocacy for Reform” project, which is implemented by the Union of Information Technology Enterprises (UITE), Armenian Lawyers’ Association (ALA) and European Business Association (EBA) with financial support of the German International Cooperation (GIZ).

Miss Mariam Zadoyan, Lawyer of the Armenian Lawyers’ Association, spoke about the necessity to make armeps system more user-friendly and the lack of opportunity to correct the mistakes or failures in case of incomplete submission of the bid. Sergey Shahnazaryan mentioned in this connection that at present the Ministry of Finance has elaborated a draft law on the elimination of these and similar problems, according to which the requirement for the tender security has been removed in case of tenders with a value of up to 70 million. This change is aimed at promoting the development of small and medium-sized businesses.

Mariam Zadoyan also presented tools to address Bid Rigging, one of the most commonly encountered forms of anti-competitive agreements, based on best international practices. The aforementioned is a secretive agreement by a group of companies on raising the price of goods or services offered in public tenders. The aforementioned is a secret agreement between a group of companies to raise prices and lower the quality of goods or services offered in public tenders.

Karen Tamazyan presented the latest legislative amendments, especially those focusing on the introduction of the latest tools for high transparency. He noted that the RA Ministry of Finance is open to hear business problems.

Further, businesses raised their problems.

At the end of the meeting other issues of interest to business representatives were discussed as well.

Notably, bizprotect.am website has been launched within the framework of the project, which provides an opportunity to report the problems that hinder the development of business, after which the specialists study the application and respond quickly to it. It is possible also to inform about a problem anonymously. The website creators, taking into consideration the international standards and experience, also have taken care that no one (including law enforcement agencies) could identify the reporting person. By the way, there are already success stories. The mobile application bizprotect.am or bizpashtpan.am has been created as well, which helps to report on a problem faster. The application allows not only sending of text information, but also the photos and documents.