Mikheil Saakashvili met with representatives of the government at the Presidential Palace today, and expressed interest in the disaster elimination works in Kakheti. The President received information regarding all of this from the Minister of Finance Alexandre Khetaguri, the President’s personal representative in Kakheti Levan Bejashvili, and the Governor of Kakheti Giorgi Gviniashvili. The Head of State touched on the disaster elimination process and also focused attention on the upcoming vintage. As Mikheil Saakashvili noted, this year’s vintage must be very well organized, and ordered the relevant persons to make sure everything is prepared accordingly.

“It is very important that first, there will be no lines this year and second, higher prices on grapes are set and kept. This is overly important because of the many destroyed vineyards in Kakheti. This is the first year when I receive information each month regarding the increase of export and realization of our wine on the world market. So we don’t even have a theoretical problem in terms of selling wine. The most important thing is for a winemaker to benefit from his grapes and that he has a reason to have grapes at all” – stated the Mikheil Saakashvili, and added that small markets will be organized in Tbilisi in the nearest future where they will be able to sell their production.

The President of Georgia also spoke about the role of Kakheti, and noted that soon Lagodekhi and Tsnori will have the function of an economic, trade, and logistical center.

“We are creating a base for production realization in Lagodekhi because this city basically has a huge potential in this sense. Lagodekhi was always a dead end, but considering our relationship with Azerbaijan, Lagodekhi must become a trade center. We should work on connecting Lagodekhi to Azerbaijan via railway, not only for the sake of Signaghi, but for the sake of the entire country. This is the nearest future of both Lagodekhi and Tsnori. These places have great potential and people also have a relevant attitude. So we must work in this direction” –stated the President of Georgia.

Mikheil Saakashvili thanked Levan Bejashvili for his work, and noted that it is very noble and important for him to leave a high government post in order to help Kakheti.

“I once again want to thank Levan greatly, because he made a very timely and important decision in order to help Kakheti. This is a very noble step for me. A lot of people would not do this, but Kakhetians are people of business and they love their region a lot. Giorgi Gviniashvili was working well but he needed help too. We are all working to take Kakheti out of this crisis so that it comes out of it even stronger” – noted the Head of State.