Meeting with Deputy Minister of Economy and Sustainable Development of Georgia Giorgi Chikovani

30 Apr '18

On April 27, 2018 BAG held a meeting with the Deputy Minister of Economy and Sustainable Development of Georgia Giorgi Chikovani in the framework of Energy Committee of BAG.

The meeting focused on the planned amendments to the Georgian Electricity Market.

In particular, the Deputy Minister presented the vision of the Ministry on Transition (the so-called hybrid) model of the Electricity Market, which means liberalization of a significant share of the market. It was noted that deregulation of the market is one of the obligations that the Georgian Government has after joining the energy union and, among other things, means the ultimate consumer's freedom to elect the electricity supplier. In addition in line with the market transition model, homeowners will remain tariff consumers, but industrial and commercial consumers will be fully deregulated. For this purpose by the end of the year it is planned to define the institution of the supplier by the law, as only the commercial operator had the right to sell electricity.

Giorgi Chikovani also informed the representatives of the companies that the government decided to partially postpone the obligation to register the  high voltage (35/110 kV) electricity user companies to direct consumers from May 1, which was explained by the absence of the suppliers' institution.

In conclusion, the representatives of the companies expressed their willingness to actively cooperate with the Ministry in the course of market reform, in turn, Giorgi Chikovani expressed readiness to ensure active involvement of business in the reform process and offered the representatives of the companies a detailed discussion of the new draft law of energy in the business Association of Georgia till the end of May.