Azerbaijan's foreign investment goes high
Foreign investment worth 1.180 billion manats (around $1.503 billion) was made in Azerbaijan's economy in January-April 2013.
The volume of foreign investments made in the country increased by 40.8 percent compared to the same period of last year, the State Statistics Committee said.
About 87.5 percent or 1.032 billion manats of the investments made by foreign countries and international organizations accounted for investors from the UK, USA, Norway, Japan, the Czech Republic, Turkey and France.
The UK continues to maintain a leading position among foreign investors in Azerbaijan. Its share in the total foreign investment was 44.1 percent, with investments totaling 520.9 million manats.
According to the statistics committee, during the reporting period US investments totaled 144.03 million manats (with a market share of 12.2 percent), while those of Norway - 112.7 million manats (9.5 percent), Japan 112.1 million manats (9.5 percent), the Czech Republic 78.7 million manats (6.7 percent), Turkey 64.4 million manats (5.5 percent), France 34.08 million manats (2.9 percent), Russia and Iran 22.09 million manats each (1.9 percent).
The World Bank was the top investor among international financial institutions by investing 39.8 million manats with a share of 3.4 percent. The Asian Development Bank directed 19.3 million manats (1.6 percent) to projects in Azerbaijan and the Islamic Development Bank - 1.08 million manats in January-April.
However, the volume of foreign investment in the country decreased by 23.4 percent in April compared to March and by 1.08 percent compared to April 2012.
Meanwhile, a total of around 4.252 billion manats was invested in the development of the economic and social sectors of Azerbaijan in January-April 2013.
The volume of investment channeled into the development of the non-oil sector was 2.838 billion manats (around 66.7 percent), while some 1.414 billion manats (33.3 percent) were invested in the oil sector. Investments in the non-oil sector increased 26.6 percent and in the oil sector - by 32.4 percent.
49.7 percent of investment was made in the industrial sector, while 18.3 percent - in transportation and warehousing, 4.7 percent agriculture, and 3.7 percent real estate transactions, including 3.6 percent in housing.
Investments in construction increased by 40.9 percent to 2.683 billion manats, or 63.1 percent of total investments. Investments worth 2.289 million manats were made in the construction of production facilities, while the funds invested in non-production facilities made up 1.963 billion manats.
Around 1.911 billion manats or 45 percent of the total investment volume was invested in fixed capital.
Adapted from Today.az