Azerbaijan, Baku, May 18 /Trend A.Akhundov/
The size of the external debt at the level of 7.6 percent of GDP doesn't cause concern, Deputy Minister of Finance Azer Bayramov said at a meeting of the parliamentary committee on economic policy on Friday.
"Today there is no heavy reliance on external debt. 7.6 percent of GDP - is a very low figure and one of the rarest in the world. It can be observed in countries that do not receive credits," Bayramov said.
The main objective of Azerbaijan, while attracting loans from abroad is not so much to attract the funding itself, as the fact that new technologies, and professionals come to the country through the foreign borrowings.
Public external debt of Azerbaijan increased by 24.9 percent in 2011. According to the government's report on the results of the previous year, external borrowings of the country on signed agreements reached $4.817 billion on January 1, 2012, while the figure was $3.857 billion on January 1, 2011.
The growth of this index by almost a quarter is due to the expansion of Azerbaijan's cooperation with various international financial organizations and with donor countries, in the result of which 12 loan agreements worth about $1.67 billion was signed in 2011 to fund meaningful project for the economy of the country.