YEREVAN, JANUARY 26, NOYAN TAPAN. With the aim of reducing the negative balance of Armenia's foreign trade, it is necessary to develop domestic production, to which, however, the current hyperappreciation of the Armenian dram is not conducive, the economist Tatul Manaserian stated at the January 26 press conference. "In the past 2-3 months the Armenian dram has been the currency that has appreciated most of all in the world, whereas the Russian ruble, the euro and the US dollar are at the stage of depreciation," he underlined, adding that by his calculations, the dram has appreciated by 27-30% as compared with the indicated currencies. In the words of T. Manaserian, the dram's appreciation is the reason why the foreign trade balance has been disturbed and domestic production rates are declining. "Thus the Armenian goods are not attractive in terms of their prices not only outside but also within the country. People prefer cheaper imported goods of the same quality," he noted. In order to overcome the current situation, according to him, the level of appreciation of the dram should be reduced gradually: "the economic and currency policies should be flexible and in line with today's conditions". "The appreciation of the national currency is a great blow to the Armenian population's purchasing capacity, especially at the current stage of the global economic crisis when the impact of the crisis will soon be felt in the Armenian economy. I think this is a serious threat to us so both the currency and economic policies need to be revised," T. Manaserian said. It should be mentioned that by official statistics, exports from Armenia fell by 7.8% to 1 billion 69 million USD, while imports grew by 35% to 4 billion 411.7 million USD in 2008 on 2007. In 2008 the average exchange rate of a US dollar made 305.97 drams (in 2007 this index made 342.08 drams).

---