Vahan Kerobyan visited the Yerevan Chocolate Factory to get acquainted with the company’s activities and problems.

The company that produces 160 types of products and exports to 16 countries (Russia, Georgia, Belgium, France, USA, Israel, Ukraine, China, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Belarus, Estonia, Mongolia, Sweden, Austria, and Netherlands), which in 2019 increased its sales volume by 30% as compared to the previous year, has had hardships in 2020 which resulted in decrease of sales volume by 15.7% as compared to 2019. Nevertheless, the shareholders replenished the equity capital by 100 million Armenian drams.

The factory initiated a program for using local fruits for production of dried fruits, chocolate-coated dried fruits and other candies with dried fruits used as filler, and as a result of this program implementation both production and sales volumes will increase significantly, thus creating around 400 new jobs. In 2021, it is planned to expand the geography of countries for export and increase the volume of exportation four times by reaching around 6․0 million USD, whereas in 2024 the volume of exportation is envisaged to increase to about 20․0 million USD.

The factory plans to make large investments in near future to expand both production and storage areas and purchase new equipment.

The factory’s activity contributed to development of partner organizations in horticulture and other related industries, such as printing houses, logistical and construction companies, thus creating new jobs in these partner organizations.

Vahan Kerobyan and the factory’s founding director Sos Sahakyan discussed the development program of the factory. The factory’s director presented to the Minister some issues hindering the implementation of the program, one of which is the availability of financial resources, and requested the Minister’s support. The need for consulting assistance was also stressed.

The presented problems will be studied by the Ministry, and appropriate measures will be taken to solve them.