Azernews.Az

By Gunay Camal

Many Armenians today feel as their financial life is one debt drama after another, as the country’s economic situation morphed into a life of each and every citizen.

So desperate is the situation that asking to borrow a few extra drams from familiars in Armenia has become as commonplace as asking a neighbor for a similarly scarce cup of flour.

The official statistics say that only in the first four months of 2016, peoples’ incomes have fallen compared by 5 billion drams ($10.47 million) in 2015, armlur.am website reports.

While the government with quite uncertain policy lacks any program or scenario to survive its ill economy, life is becoming more and more complicated in this poor country. High corruption and quite strong monopoly suck the society like octopus, leaving no hope for normal life.

The first four months of 2016 saw a decline of 1 percent in trade, 7.4 percent in construction. Last year's GDP decreased by approximately $1 billion compared to 2014.

Meanwhile, Armenia's total public debt stood at $5.196.1 billion as of late March, an increase of 1.5 percent compared to February, according to the National Statistical Service. When compared to early 2016, the total public debt was up by 2.3 percent.

The external debt of the country at the end of March 2016 stood at $4.406 billion, an increase of 1.5 percent or $63.6 million from the previous month.

As Armenian authorities announced, the country’s national debt will account for 49.4 percent of GDP from the beginning of the year, and the ratio of external debt to GDP will be 42.8 percent. The size of the national debt by the end of 2016 will amount to $5.569 billion, 86.6 percent of which will be external debt, Armenian ARKA reports.

In 2016 the country’s national debt to the GDP will make up 49.4 percent versus 48.3 percent in 2015, with the foreign debt to the GDP ratio to be 42.8 percent in 2016 versus 42.3 percent in 2015.

The official figures show that the Armenian economy is on the verge of catastrophe. In case the ratio of the country’s national debt to the GDP exceeds 50 percent, the country will fell into an economic abyss.

“In spite of assurances from the International Monetary Fund that the threatening figure is 60 percent, I am totally against this approach. If we increase the volume of internal debt, no matter how we try, we will not be able to service our debts,” Armenian expert Tatul Manaseryan told local media.

The miserable economic situation of ordinary Armenians are also revealed in Armenian Demographic and Health Surveys (ADHS) carried out in 2000, 2005 and 2010, which showed that the percentage of starving Armenian children rise. The prevalence of stunting (low height for age) among Armenian children under age five remained steady at 13 percent between 2000 and 2005, while in 2010 increased to 19 percent, according to 2015 report by the World Breastfeeding Initiatives report.

Amid the backdrop of the nation’s economic hardship, the rate of suicide in Armenia, steadily going up almost every year. From 2003 to 2013, the annual number of suicides and suicide attempts in this economically challenged country, soared from 377 to 768 cases – a more than 100 percent increase, according to the National Statistical Service.

“There are many reports about those who commit suicide, and if something is being kept constantly in focus, it gradually turns into something normal,” Yerevan State University social psychologist Vladimir Mikaelian told eurasianet.org.

While the data showing the real situation lacks, some observers link the rise with tough economic conditions, in which nearly a third of Armenia’s population of 2.9 million people lives. Suicide is also on the rise is in the military. Since 2010, more military servicemen have committed suicide than died in combat.

More and more Armenian citizens leave the country every year, finding conditions of life in the country to tough to bear.

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