News - Vicente Barrientos: Armenia can become transport-logistics hub

Armenia can become a transport-logistics hub for the movement of goods, services, and capital. Brazilian professor Vicente Barrientos, who is President of BRICS Center, stated this at the international forum, entitled "New Horizons of Cooperation between Armenia and EAEU with BRICS and SCO," which is being held in Yerevan. Barrientos added that the use of the US dollars and the euro in trade between BRICS members has been considerably reduced in the last two years, while the role of national currencies in the calculations of participating countries has increased. However, as the expert noted, there are difficulties in cross-border payments within the BRICS+ countries due to sanctions. In his opinion, Armenia could play an important role in solving these problems. "Now Armenia's economy is developing dynamically, and considering its geographical proximity to two BRICS+ countries—Russia and Iran, financial and banking services could become the basis of the country's prosperity, as it happened in the case of Switzerland, Luxembourg, Singapore, Ireland, and Uruguay, which did not have significant natural resources as Armenia has," Barrientos emphasized. He noted that it is necessary to develop a strategy for the development of financial infrastructure and ensure the goals that are being included in the BRICS+ tasks. "Armenia could participate in the creation of a system that would be an alternative to SWIFT," the professor noted.