Epress.am News from Armenia
Migration from Armenia is a natural process: it is the response to the policies and the situation created in the country, as a result of policies pursued today, said ethnographer Aghasi Tadevosyan, speaking to journalists in Yerevan today.
“Leaving the country are individuals who have the human capital required in other countries. Naturally, this capital is invested in other economies, other cultures and benefits other countries’ development. But the whole issue lies in whether our authorities have put Armenia’s development [on their agenda]. If since independence governments addressed the country’s development and had a strategic development plan, then they would understand that they need also human resources that will be the guarantee of this development. But today we don’t have such an issue — we are suffering only with the pain of mine exploitation,” he said.
Another speaker at today’s press conference, demographer Ruben Yeganyan, agreed that migration is a natural phenomenon.
“I find it hard to call that which happened in our country in the past 20 years a phenomenon aimed at structural development. It was a phenomenon that allowed us to survive. A huge portion of our population is earning money abroad which is allowing him and his family to engage in simple reproduction [to give birth to future generations],” he said.