Press Release
Polish Economic Advisor Balcerowicz Arrives in Georgia
August 8, 2000
Tbilisi-- On Tuesday, August 8, Leszek Balcerowicz will arrive in Tbilisi for preliminary meetings over the next three days with President Shevardnadze and senior Georgian officials. Balcerowicz’s visit this week follows a preparatory visit in late July by Dr. Ewa Balcerowicz and Jerzy Miller of CASE Institute, Warsaw.
A press conference will be held on Friday, August 10 to summarize the results of meetings with the President and senior Georgian officials. At the request of President Shevardnadze, the U.S. government is funding Balcerowicz’s economic advisory activities in Georgia through the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the development assistance agency of the U.S. government.
Balcerowicz served as the former Polish vice-premier and finance minister from 1989 through 1991, implementing a plan of rapid stabilization and transformation, widely known as the Balcerowicz plan. Since 1992, Balcerowicz has served as a professor at the Warsaw School of Economics and since 1995 has been the leader of the major Polish political party, Freedom Union (Unia Wolnosci).