Impressive IT innovations put on display at Bakutel

President Ilham Aliyev, First Lady Mehriban Aliyeva, and their daughters Leyla Aliyeva and Arzu Aliyeva attended Bakutel 2018, the 24th Azerbaijan International Exhibition and Conference on Telecommunications and Information Technologies, at the Baku Expo Center on December 4.

Minister of Transport, Communications and High Technologies Ramin Guluzade informed President Ilham Aliyev and his wife Mehriban Aliyeva of the exhibition.

President Ilham Aliyev and First Lady Mehriban Aliyeva viewed pavilions of the exhibition.

President Ilham Aliyev answered questions from Russia-24 channel as he viewed Bakutel 2018 exhibition.

Speaking of the non-oil sector, President Aliyev noted that the development of the non-oil sector, in an effort to enable Azerbaijan’s economy to develop steadily regardless of the global situation with oil prices, is the main task, and the government successfully accomplishes with it.

"Therefore, a lot is being done in terms of the development of infrastructure projects in order to create good conditions for business. A lot of projects are connected with business promotion, assistance to the entrepreneurs. In general, the investment and business climate in Azerbaijan is improving. The latest data of the World Bank says that Azerbaijan, is in 25th place in Doing Business Report. Over the year we have advanced by 32 steps, and today we are among the leading countries on the possibility of doing business. Therefore, of course, the sphere that is represented here is very important from the point of view of business, and from the point of view of innovations, and from the point of view of education. This is an area that is one of our priorities, and it is no coincidence that we are already holding the 24th year of such an exhibition. The number of participating companies is growing from year to year," he said.

The head of state noted that this year there are 230 participants, almost more than half are Azerbaijani companies.

"This suggests that we are ready to work in this direction in order to develop the country and create new jobs, because the oil sector does not create jobs," he said.

"One must constantly strive to create jobs in line with the level of economic development, taking into account the demographic growth in Azerbaijan. We must strive to ensure that every newly born citizen in 20-30 years will be provided with job," he said.

Speaking of tourism development, President Aliyev noted that Russia is in the first place for the number of tourists coming to Azerbaijan.

The country has seen growth in tourism over the past two years, which is by 22 percent in 2016, and by 20 percent in 2017, he said adding that there will be growth this year as well. "Tourists are attracted, first of all, by the conditions in which they feel themselves here. As for the Russians, I think they feel at home. There is no language barrier here, a very good attitude towards them, our common history also plays an important role," he said.