At the time of this writing, Lazika is little more than a murky coastal marsh. In the next 10 years however, we will see skyscrapers, allotments, and business districts rise up from this blank canvas. The city of Lazika could possibly become the Dubai of the Black Sea.
This new and exciting project would allow Caucasus to turn the page of economic transition, and start down the path of aggressive development. Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili has set a budget for the project to the sum of $682 million, to get the city started. The 10 year goal is to build a city of the future- part resort, part business center, Lazika is poised to compete not only with Dubai, but also with its closer, expanding competitor, the city of Baku (Azerbaijan).
Lazika is expected to drastically stimulate Georgia’s economy, especially in the engineering and construction sectors, as was seen in 1998, with the building of the new Kazakh capital of Astana. Mikhail Saakashvili is counting on Lazika’s attractiveness to investors in order to continue to expand the city, so that it may one day become the Dubai of the Black Sea.
This is not the only project that is attracting more and more domestic and foreign investors in Georgia. Money is being poured into projects such as the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline, the Kars-Akhalkalaki-Tbilisi railway, and the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum pipeline, to name a few. Investors around the world are starting to see Georgia in a very positive light, and the rewards that can be reaped from investing in the Georgian economy are becoming more and more evident. In World Bank’s “Doing Business 2010” report, Georgia was ranked at #11, up 27 places from their rank in 2007. This massive leap in performance is the result of reforms set into effect by Mikhail Saakashvili, ever since he became President of Georgia in 2004.
Georgia’s GDP has seen significant growth over the past few years, with a growth rate of 12.3% in 2007, 9.4% in 2006, and 9.6% in 2005. In 2008 however, war with Russia broke out, and Georgia’s economic growth shrank to 2.3%, continuing to slide deeper into recession through 2009. Since the war ended, Georgia’s GDP has started to climb again, from 2% in 2010, to 7% in 2011, and is expected to hit 8.8% in 2012.
Projects such as the future city of Lazika are expected to provide strong economic growth for Georgia, but they are not the only ones looking to expand their economy. American business tycoon Donald Trump recently announced that he will be investing $100 million in Batumi, to build a 47-floor building dubbed “Trump Tower.”