Diversity is growing in Georgian agriculture. Not just the variety of crops, which now span from climate-hardy ancient grains to modern variants of indigenous fruits such as blueberries, olives, and asparagus and new ones like avocados – but in technologies and scale. Though challenged by climate change, pest plagues, and the post-Soviet bequest that left the industry dominated by hundreds of thousands of tiny farms, Georgia is innovating.
Currently lacking the driver of foreign investment, Georgia is also exploring ways agriculture could be encouraged while complying with the land ownership restrictions. One ambitious example in the main greens-producing area of Imereti, with the backing of the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Agriculture (MEPA), is the Imereti Agro Zone, with its project for the Imereti Greenhouse Cluster.
Run by a Georgian-Dutch consortium, the project includes a fully serviced complex (gas, water, electricity, drainage, permits to build, etc.), extending over several hundred hectares: open to all, local and foreign, to set up their greenhouses on a turn-key basis.
For the full article, follow the link: https://www.investor.ge/2022/04/18/the-changing-landscape-of-georgian-agriculture/
Article author: Sally White