Brief Overview of Armenia’s Energy Sector; Key Contacts in Armenia’s
Health Care and Pharmaceutical Sectors

BISNIS Armenia Update
23 March 2005

Contents:
1. Now on the BISNIS web site
2. Press Release: New World Bank Project in Armenia
3. News Items on Armenia
4. Grant Announcement – Armenia-US Bilateral Science Grants

**************************************************************
New Reports on the BISNIS and State Dept web sites:

— Brief Overview of Armenia’s Energy Sector

— Armenia: Commercial News Summary
wsam.htm

— Key Contacts in Armenia’s Health Care and Pharmaceutical Sectors

— Armenia: Consular Information Sheet
/cis_1141.html

********************************** ****************************
World Bank Supports Improvement of Water and Wastewater Services in Yerevan

WASHINGTON, February 24, 2005.

The World Bank’s Board today approved an International Development
Association (IDA) credit of US$20 million for the Yerevan Water and
Wastewater Project (YWWP). The credit will assist the Armenian
Government in its efforts to improve Yerevan’s water and wastewater
system by continuing and expanding accomplishments achieved under a
previous IDA-financed Municipal Development Project (MDP).

The YWWP will help provide Yerevan with safe, continuous water supply
while reducing environmental pollution. This is the third IDA-financed
water and wastewater project in Armenia. The World Bank also financed
the initial Municipal Development Project to support Yerevan’s Water and
Sanitation Company (YWSC) and a more recent (FY04) Municipal Water and
Wastewater Project for Armenia’s medium and small-sized cities.

“Because of Government’s visionary leadership of the Armenian water
sector, and diligent efforts by all project participants, significant
improvements have been made in Yerevan’s water service since the first
project began in 1998,” said Brian Steven Smith, head of the World Bank
team designing the YWWP.”Much work still remains of course, and we look
forward to continued improvement during implementation of the new project.”

The Project benefits directly from Yerevan’s successful experience with
a management contractor recruited under the MDP. For the YWWP,
Government will increase private sector involvement and competitively
recruit an operator for YWSC under a lease contract. The Project will
finance investments in YWSC during the first five years of the lease.

The Project has two components: a YWWP Fund and Technical Assistance.
The YWWP Fund will finance investments undertaken by the water utility
operator during implementation, which will yield energy savings,
improved reliability of supply, and reduction of environmental
pollution. The Technical Assistance component will fund interim
operational management of YWSC, project financial and technical audits,
and incremental operating expenses.

The Credit will be made to Armenia on standard IDA terms, including 40
years maturity and a 10-year grace period.

Since joining the World Bank in 1992 and IDA in 1993, the commitments to
Armenia total approximately US$ 860 million for 38 operations.

For more information on the World Bank’s activities in Armenia, please
visit:

**************************************************************
News Items

NEW ARMENIAN AMBASSADOR TO WASHINGTON APPOINTED

Armenian President Robert Kocharian appointed Tatul Markarian on 19
March as Armenia’s new ambassador to the United States, Mediamax
reported. The 41-year-old Markarian previously served as a senior
Armenian diplomat in Washington for four years in the mid-1990s and has
been a deputy foreign minister since June 2000. He has significant
experience in mediation talks with Azerbaijan over the Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict. RG
Source: RFE/RL Newsline, 21 March 2005,

**************************************************************
Armenia posts twofold increase in mobile subscribers

RBC, 15.03.2005, Erevan 15:59:08.

As of January 1, 2005, the number of subscribers to mobile services
reached 203,309 compared to 111,118 at the beginning of 2003, the press
department of ArmenTel reported. In 2004, ArmenTel’s revenue from
providing mobile communications services advanced 46 percent to
EUR27.483m. This increase is due to the company focusing on the
development of mobile communications services. In 2004 the company
allocated 41.6 percent more funds for investments in the development of
mobile communications, which rose to EUR17.364m.

Source:

**************************************************************
NATIONAL FOUNDATION OF SCIENCE AND ADVANCED TECHNOLOGIES (NFSAT) AND
U.S. CIVILIAN RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT FOUNDATION (CRDF)

2005 ARMENIAN-U.S. BILATERAL GRANTS PROGRAM

The National Foundation of Science and Advanced Technologies (NFSAT) and
the U.S. Civilian Research and Development Foundation (CRDF) announce
the fourth competition for the 2005 Armenian-U.S. Bilateral Grants
Program (BGP-IV).

The three primary goals of this program are to support high quality,
innovative research and development by establishing sustainable
U.S.-Armenian research collaborations, to provide an alternative to
emigration for Armenian scientists, and to fully employ former weapons
research scientists in civilian research.

This merit-based competition provides 18 to 24 months of support to
joint research teams of Armenian and U.S. scientists and engineers.
Joint proposals may be submitted for cooperation in civilian research
and development in all basic and applied sciences (see Appendix 1).

NFSAT and CRDF will give the highest priority to proposals that include
former weapons scientists and junior scientists, including undergraduate
and graduate students at Armenian universities, scientists who have
completed their Ph.D. or Kandidat degrees within the last six years, as
well as participants at institutes located outside Yerevan.

· All awards will be for collaboration between researchers of Armenia
and their counterparts in the United States.
· The Armenian Principal Investigator and all Armenian team members
must be citizens or permanent residents of the Republic of Armenia who
will reside in Armenia during the course of the grant period. The U.S.
Principal Investigator must be a U.S. citizen or permanent resident and
must reside in the U.S. during the course of the grant period.
· Applicants may request up to US$30,000 for an 18-24 month period.
At least 80% of total project costs must be designated for the Armenian
team and no more than 20% for the U.S. team.
· Applicants must submit original hardcopies of the proposal in
English and Armenian (or Russian) and electronic copies of the proposal
in English and Armenian (or Russian) to NFSAT and an electronic copy in
English to CRDF through the CRDF website.
· For explanatory purposes or for the sake of clarification, this
Program Announcement may be translated into one or more languages other
than English. In the event of the existence of such translations, the
English-language version shall serve as the definitive variant in
determining the interpretation of any provision of this Announcement.

The deadline for BGP proposals to be submitted to NFSAT and CRDF is 6:00
pm (local time in Armenia and the U.S. respectively) on May 16, 2005.
The competition results are expected to be announced on November 1,
2005. All decisions of NFSAT and CRDF are final.

For more information, go to

********** Forwarded by: ***************************
Ellen S. House, BISNIS Trade Specialist for Armenia
U.S. Department of Commerce
Tel: 202/482-2284, Fax: 202/482-2293

NEED FINANCING FOR A PROPOSED SALE TO EURASIA?
BISNIS FinanceLink helps U.S. companies find financing for export
transactions where a Eurasian buyer has already been identified.
For more information:

–Boundary_(ID_+3V/Un4SO24POxQ8pAt2aQ)–