EMPLOYMENT: ARARAT’S BIGGEST CHALLENGE
Support A1+!“Everybody knows that Ararat was once a thriving industrial town. Currently there are only two factories: cement and gold processing. But they are not able to solve the unemployment problem in the town”. These were the words of the 45 year old Ararat inhabitant, Gevorg Haroutyunyan, who is currently out of a job.
After losing his job due to the close of the local Water Supply Department, Gevorg Haroutyunyan was forced to open a small clothes shop. There are days now, when he cannot sell a thing. “Ararat has become a dirty and poor town whose inhabitants feel helpless”, he remarks.
“They want money for a job in the hospital. But I don’t have that kind of money. Recently, I began working as a cleaner in two local shops. I’d rather have little food to eat than to leave my home country for some source of livelihood”, sighs 37-year-old Liana Soghomonyan who is trained to be a medical nurse but at present has no job.
According to Shoghik Karapetyan, most of the inhabitants of Ararat today do not have the resources to leave Ararat and look for a job in other places. They are ‘stuck’ in Ararat. He states, “There was a time when there were a lot of plants here. But presently there are only two factories, which by themselves cannot solve all the problems of Ararat. It is everybody’s dream today to work in the AGRC Gold Processing Plant because of the higher wages and other fringe benefits such as children of employees getting schoolbags and stationary. I also heard that when the AGRC plant was closed for two weeks this year all its employees got salaries.” With a look of dismay Shoghik’s wife adds, “All our hopes today rest on foreigners. But I do not know how feasible that is. Can’t businessmen and the government work together to once make Ararat and industrial centre?”. The most interesting sources of information in Ararat, as everywhere else, are taxi-drivers. “Recently the authorities wanted to close the Gold Processing Plant without considering how the workers would earn their daily bread. Then they (higher authorities) complain that people are wanting to leave Ararat. What else do you expect people without jobs to do? ”, noted one of the drivers.
Nowadays however the young people are taking the risk and leaving for Yerevan in search of a livelihood. As a result, Ararat is now left with a largely aged population. It is already six years since Hakob Tovmasyan, who represents Republican Party, took over as the Major of the town. According to him, “Industrial towns tend to rise fast, but also fall quickly. He adds, “Ararat’s two plants have a total of 5000 employees. But these two plants alone cannot solve all the local problems”, points Mr.Tovmasyan. The only pride of Ararat population is Vazgen Sargsyan who was once their compatriot, and, as the Major noted, the process of Artsakh’s liberation had begun from Ararat’s major square under Vazgen Sargsyan’s leadership. Ararat needs a hero, a new fountain of hope, who can make the people want to look forward to a brighter future.
