“You cannot imagine how colossal the financial loss is: 250,000 people are unemployed.” – Georgian Restaurateurs Association founder Shota Burjanadze
“You cannot imagine how colossal the financial loss is: 250,000 people have been left unemployed. If the business is not allowed to continue operations, Germany, Greece and Israel will not be enough for these people to go and work abroad,” Georgian Restaurateurs Association founder Shota Burjanadze said at a press briefing on Monday when commenting on the current governmental restrictions on restaurants.
He noted that only 700 out of 10,000 food outlets are currently operating, and only 10% of those have an open space to serve customers.
“We have a difficult triangle in the country: the economic crisis, the COVID crisis and the political crisis. The only way to open this triangle is to solve the economic crisis and enable small and medium-sized businesses to develop economically. I think there is no doubt that this step will be taken by the government and the existing restrictions will be changed gradually, in a short time. Otherwise, a social explosion is inevitable.
“Today, it is important to open winter resorts, then to open the indoor spaces of restaurants, allow them to operate on weekends, and change the ‘curfew’ times. The sooner this happens, the better, because the business that is on the verge of liquidation will be given the opportunity to recover gradually,” Burjanadze stated at Mtavari media center.
Regarding the issue of whether the sector is requesting a meeting with nominee Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili, he said that if adequate decisions are made, he does not see the need for a face-to-face meeting.
For the record, eateries have been allowed to serve customers in open spaces since February 15. However, they are still not allowed to open indoor spaces or to operate on weekends.
By Ana Dumbadze
