The President of the National Bank of Georgia, Koba Gvenetadze, was invited as the First Sitting Speaker and spoke on the topic - Covid-19 and Recent Geopolitical Challenges: Macroeconomic Consequences and Prospects. According to Koba Gvenetadze, the escalation of a large-scale conflict in the region will also affect the Georgian economy and intensify the external shock in three main areas: exports, remittances and tourism.

The President of the National Bank stressed the importance of the program supported by the IMF through the expanded financing mechanism in 2017-2021 and noted that this program contributed to the economic recovery of Georgia.

"Inflation is a significant global challenge of recent times. The contribution of temporary factors to inflation remains high, posing risks of rising long-term inflation expectations. It is in response to these risks that monetary policy has been in a tightened phase since the spring of 2021 to ensure that recent price increases, mainly due to temporary factors, do not lead to an increase in long-term inflation expectations. We are one of the few central banks to publicly announce the expected monetary policy rate trajectory. By publishing the monetary policy rate forecast, we are helping the market to form consistent expectations from an economic perspective. This helps reduce macroeconomic uncertainty, which is especially important during the pandemic," - Koba Gvenetadze said.