Georgians drawn into global network

By Georgy Kalatozishvili, Tbilisi. Exclusively for Vestnik Kavkaza

Georgian State Minister for Diasporas Constantine Surguladze recently said that 1.5 million people have left the country since Georgia became an independent state. Considering that 5.3 million people lived in the Georgian SSR, according to the census of 1989, migration in Georgia has one of the highest rates among post-Soviet states. As a result, the diaspora grows in different countries and the Georgian government wonders about means of controlling emigration to keep those how left the country in touch with their homeland and encourage them to help the country.

In Surguladze’s words, ‘the global network of diasporas’ plans to help calculate the number of migrants, stimulate cooperation between them and involve them in economic and social processes of Georgia. The Internet, video conferences, mail links, meetings and other forms of contacts will be used.

The office of the state minister for diasporas told Vestnik Kavkaza that it was forming a special group to establish the ‘global network.’ The office is currently collecting information and inviting heads of the diaspora council. The process is complicated. Georgians living abroad are reluctant to take part in joint projects. This is what distinguishes them from many other diasporas. Georgians abroad care about their family and relatives left in the homeland. There is not a single influential organization in any state with a more or less large Georgian diaspora. Usually, as in Russia, for example, there are a few associations whose leaders compete with each other.

The state minister has decided to break this tradition and use economic and business interest as the tool to do that. He expects that ‘the global  network will concentrate a lot of information about investments, so that Georgian businessmen abroad could use it to choose a potential field for allocation of capital.’

According to Vestnik Kavkaza, it is the economic aspect that will be the determining part in the project to form a global network. It is clear that 200 Georgian families living in Russia, for instance, control assets worth a total of $50 billion. This sum exceeds the Georgian budget for 2013 tenfold.

Ex-Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili, a billionaire, complained that dozens of large Russian businessmen of Georgian origin willing to invest in Georgia were addressing him. They wanted him to ‘form a legislative basis and a platform to serve projects.’ Such ‘platform’ is what the ‘global network’ is developed for, primarily for the Georgian diaspora in Russia, the largest of all diasporas (about 158,000 people, according to the latest census). Hundreds of thousands of Georgians live in the US and Europe but their influence and opportunities are incomparable with those in Russia.

Surguladze noted that the government was ready to grant funds to help Georgian businessmen living abroad, should they decide to invest in Georgia. This most likely means the six-billion-dollar fund Ivanishvili formed for co-investments. He has recently quit the Georgian Dream Party and said that he will engage in public activities, resigning from politics. Some say that the billionaire meant involvement in various business projects. If so, then Ivanishvili is forming the ‘global diaspora network’ for his multibillion-dollar fund.