UN General Assembly
1997

of a medium-term macroeconomic reform programme supported by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. The major objectives for the 1997 period are: to maintain a real annual growth rate in gross domestic product of about 6 per cent; to continue curbing the inflation rate for the whole year and keeping it under 10 per cent; and to augment the level of gross foreign exchange reserves to the equivalent of 2.8 months of imports. Also, the Government of Armenia will go on to take several measures during the programme period aimed at continuing to refine the targeting of social safety-net benefits to alleviate a sharp decrease in average consumption levels and improve income distribution. For Armenia and countries with economies in transition as a whole, the move towards world market prices brought severely deteriorated terms of trade. The introduction of currency convertibility and a notable increase in external borrowing began to cause frequent unsustainable external debt positions. The resources which are urgently required to modernize the industrial structure to internationally competitive levels and to improve the