23 April 2020, Baku: The Cooperation Council with Entrepreneurs under the Management Board of the Central Bank held its next meeting on 22 April 2020, participated by representatives of the National Confederation of Entrepreneurs Organizations (NCEO), the Azerbaijan Banks Association (ABA), banks and entrepreneurs, represented at the Council. The main goal of the meeting was to identify challenges the entrepreneurs face amid COVID-19 pandemic and areas of cooperation with the banking sector on the way out of the situation.

Addressing the meeting Elman Rustamov, Governor of the Central Bank, spoke about consistent efforts, urgent actions taken under direct leadership of the President Ilham Aliyev and tasks set for the financial sector on mitigating impact of the crisis faced by the global economy on the national economy, protecting health of the population and maintaining economic activity amid coronavirus pandemic and oil price slump in global oil markets. The macroeconomic situation in the country and tasks set for economic regulatory institutions on socio-economic development and the financial sector are always in the center of attention. Macroeconomic stability continues, inflation is on an acceptable level, the exchange rate of the national currency – manat is stable, and the situation in the FX market has considerably normalized. The situation in the banking sector is satisfactory, liquidity is normal, lending activity continues recovering, in parallel with increase in business lending and decrease in consumer lending. The savings base of the population has increased and dedollarization kicked off over recent months.

Elman Rustamov noted that, today one of the issues on focus is to make the macroeconomic environment, businesses operate in, sustainable, stable and forecastable, and maintain support for businesses from the former. Under the new circumstances the macroeconomic framework must be built in such a way as to maintain macroeconomic stability in the face of low oil prices.

Later referring to the results of the previous meeting held with entrepreneurs and commercial bank managers the Central Bank Governor mentioned that most of the issues raised by businesses at the previous meeting have already been resolved – regulation of import operations has been liberalized, significant works have been done within the Council to bring the cheque settlement system to Azerbaijan. Active efforts are under way to expand financial – real sector cooperation, issue unsecured loans in rural areas and support the self-employment program in response to challenges by Mister President.

Meeting participants were invited to discuss the issues on the agenda after Elman Rustamov’s introductory meeting. Managers of the NCEO, the ABA and commercial banks and entrepreneurs told that, the positive results of the previous meeting once more prove that the dialogue between entrepreneurs and the financial-banking sector initiated by the Central Bank is of key importance. The active dialogue under way both allow better access of businesses to financial and banking services, and contribute to proper assessment of real macroeconomic stance by entrepreneurs and to the development of entrepreneurial activities, production and services in the country and prompt resolving of the problems they face.

The challenges faced by entrepreneurs during pandemic, proposals on support mechanisms for pandemic-affected businesses, and related cooperation prospects between entrepreneurs and financial institutions were broadly discussed. Noting the difficulties faced during the pandemic the entrepreneurs voiced their opinions on restructuring credit liabilities due to the banking sector, allocating new loans to resolve shortfall of working capital in their current activities, taking additional actions to improve the currency regime, reviewing opportunities for using cash funds in settlements, in particular in settlements in small businesses, reviewing opportunities for introduction of related cheque settlements, simplifying requirements on micro lending mechanisms, and broader utilization of guarantee mechanisms for activation of business lending.

Summarizing the findings of the discussions E.Rustamov noted the usefulness of the meeting and told that the issues raised and the proposals seconded at the meeting will be studied in depth followed by joint work on the said directions.