Baku hosts German-Azerbaijani Business Forum on Energy & ICT

Baku hosted German-Azerbaijani Business Forum 2018 on Energy and ICT on October 9.

Addressing the forum, Deputy Energy Minister of Azerbaijan Natig Abbasov said that Azerbaijan and Germany have established versatile cooperation in the field of energy and there are all possibilities for expanding this cooperation.

“As you know, the Uniper company is one of the buyers of Azerbaijani gas in the framework of the Shah Deniz-2 project. The recently signed new agreement in the field of oil and gas production, energy efficiency, use of new technologies, optimization of energy consumption and reduction of carbon emissions will contribute to the development of this sphere in Azerbaijan,” he said.

Abbasov went on to say that the SOCAR-Uniper joint venture, operating from 2016, is conducting modernization based on German technologies at the Azerikimya Production Union’s enterprises.

He stressed that there are great opportunities for Uniper company to participate in the project of modernization and reconstruction of the gas distribution network in Baku city and Absheron peninsula, reduction of losses, use, optimization and management of power stations.

Speaking at the forum, Deputy Vice-President of SOCAR on investments and marketing Vitaly Beglyarbekov noted that Azerbaijan hopes to raise $1.5 billion by the end of 2018 for the Southern Gas Corridor project.

“We are working to attract German financial resources. We plan to raise $1.5 billion by the end of 2018,” Beglyarbekov said.

Earlier, it was reported that Azerbaijan intends to attract from European banks up to $1.5 billion for 15 years for the Southern Gas Corridor project. The assistance in obtaining a syndicated loan is provided by the Euler Hermes company.

The Southern Gas Corridor is one of the priority projects for the EU and provides for the transportation of 10 billion cubic meters of Azerbaijani gas from the Caspian region through Georgia and Turkey to Europe.

On May 29, Baku hosted the launch ceremony of the first phase of the Southern Gas Corridor project, and on June 12, the opening ceremony of TANAP pipeline was held in the Turkish province of Eskisehir with the participation of the presidents of Azerbaijan - Ilham Aliyev, Turkey - Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Ukraine - Petro Poroshenko and Serbia - Alexander Vucic.

The gas from the Azerbaijani Shah Deniz field has already gone through the first segment of the Southern Gas Corridor - from the Sangachal terminal to the expanded South Caucasus Pipeline. The next stage is the commissioning of the TANAP gas pipeline, through which gas will flow into Turkey and further to Europe.

In turn, Head of the office of the State Agency for the provision of services to citizens and social innovations under the President of Azerbaijan Azad Jafarli said that Azerbaijan is switching to a new model of e-government, working on the model of “one-stop shop”.

“All the necessary services will be provided on the basis of a single e-government infrastructure. In this regard, we intend to take another innovative step by introducing the socalled “caring state” concept, through which citizens can receive information about the services they need in advance. We believe that this contributes both to the improvement of the existing services provided in the ASAN service centers and to the expansion of other electronic services,” Jafarli stated.

Further, Jafarli underlined that the number of calls to ASAN service centers has reached approximately 25 million so far, adding that two utility centers have been involved in Baku, and the total number of citizens appealing to these centers has reached 815,000, since January 2015.

“The number of unique appeals of citizens to the ASAN service centers was 5.6 million. Currently, the assessment of the level of digitalization of more than 630 government services is conducted. In particular, work on the implementation of major projects such as Asan Payment, Asan Visa, electronic license has began and portals of electronic services have been launched. In general, the formation of e-services and creation of effective database is a priority for the state and work carried out in this direction is the basis for the successful development of the country”, Jafarli explained.

Taking his turn, Director of the Information Technologies Department of Central Bank of Azerbaijan (CBA) Farid Osmanov stated that the CBA will cooperate with IBM in the blockchain technology.

He went on to say that the program will be implemented in two directions.

“The first direction meets the plans for digital transformation. This initiative will be implemented approximately within the framework of the five-year plan, which aims to meet the requirements and needs of the economy and the banking sector of the country. The second direction is the development of a digital identification system,” he underlined.

Further, touching upon noncash payments, Osmanov stressed that the turnover of non-cash payments in Azerbaijan will reach 17 billion manats ($10 billion).

He expressed hope that the level of cash payments will be reduced from current 74 percent to 40 percent.

Speaking of a new initiative jointly with MasterCard, which envisages the creation of a favorable environment, transparency and efficiency in the economy, Osmanov underlined that work in this direction is carried out within the framework of the relevant state program.

“We believe that the state program to be implemented until 2020 and we will be able to achieve the development of e-commerce and ebanking industry,” he concluded.

The forum was attended by officials of ministries and agencies of Azerbaijan, the German Embassy in Azerbaijan, Azerbaijan’s state oil company SOCAR, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), BP, Siemens SC, SAP, Lahmeyer International GmbH, DHL Global Forwarding, PASHA Bank, etc.

Presently, more than 200 companies with German capital operate in Azerbaijan.

In January-August 2018, Azerbaijan’s trade turnover with Germany exceeded $1.05 billion, according to Azerbaijan’s State Customs Committee. Exports of Azerbaijani products for the period to Germany exceeded $619.5 million.