On May 24 of the current year, Young Scientists Union "Intellect" hosted Adjara A/R local council meeting.

Meeting was attended by 24 participants, including: 7  CSOs  representatives; 12 SMEs /Cooperatives representatives; 4 Public officials / local administration representatives; One representative  of Adjara Television.

The meeting Agenda covered the following issues: Main challenges for economic development in Ajara AR; Discussion of governmental initiatives (SME support, regulations/restrictions, recommendations); Formulation of recommendations and messages; Election of 2 candidates to represent LAC in the Central Advisory Council (CAC) .

Upon completion of the meeting, Memorandum on Cooperation ways introduced to attending LAC members; LAC members agreed, that in the nearest days all LAC participants will sign the memorandum. Also, near the end  of the LAC meeting, all attending participants anonymously filled out the post LAC survey forms to evaluate the proceedings and results of the meeting and shared their opinion on how much the meeting met their expectations and how satisfactory and useful it was, and also specified the most relevant issues with regard to target sub-sector and SME development in the region and finally named topics for possible discussion during the future LAC meetings.

As the next step of the meeting, LAC members, with the  help of facilitator discussed and identified problems and constraining factors for the prioritized sub-sectors. Among these, during the present LAC meeting were selected 2 sub-sectors which got highest number of points. These were Beekeeping (with total 43 points) and Fish (fresh-water) farming (with total 40 points). In the section above are provided current problems and obstacles in these sub-sectors as listed by LAC participants.  

The participants evaluated their meeting with expectations by 4.38 points and content satisfaction level with 4,31 points.

Participants anticipated that they would consider  problematic issues that impede development of small and medium business in the region.

On the following question:”did participation in LAC help  you   to increase your   involvement in the DCFTA implementation?” 69% of participants responded “yes”, 31% responded- “partly”.

The participants stated the following outstanding issues for the development of small and medium enterprises: Knowledge dissemination about DCFTA and new regulations; Existence of state support programs; Involvement of relevant agencies  in the problem solving issues; Export-Import Issues; Cooperative development; Mediator presence.

In the section “additional  comments”, participants indicated time discrepancy and a set of directions to be discussed. Consequently,  they recommended to discuss one direction during a meeting and invite  expertss of relevant direction.

Participants considered such meetings as necessary; Part of them  noted that it is desirable to organize similar meetings with more intensity; Part of them noted that it is desirable to prepare practical guidelines for each direction and develope specific written recommendations after meetings.

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