Simplified licensing procedure to contribute to doing business

/By AzerNews/

By Aynur Karimova

The companies that are doing business in Azerbaijan, or planning to do so, would be able to enjoy the simplified licensing procedure also in 2016.

Expert Vugar Bayramov told Azernews that simplification of the licensing procedure has allowed the companies and entrepreneurs to get licenses in a simple way, which will positively affect the business doing.

"The simplification of the licensing procedure, decrease of their number, application of online license portals offering issuing licenses, reduced amount of duties, issuance of perpetual licenses, and most important - online issuance of licenses have allowed to get licenses without making any illegal payments and avoid illegal procedures," he noted.

The Economy and Industry Ministry issued 264 licenses to entrepreneurs through the ASAN service centers in 2015. Some 202 licenses were issued in Baku while 62 licenses - in Azerbaijan's regions.

Bayramov believes that the number of licenses to be issued in 2016 will increase as these procedures were simplified at the end of 2015.

"More entrepreneurs are expected to turn to the ASAN service centers to get licenses. Furthermore, licenses for some sectors, including, taxi service and production, import and sale of alcohol drinks, were cancelled," he added.

Thus, the main quality factor in licensing is not the number of licenses, but easing an access to licenses and increasing the number of non-licensed fields.

"The licenses are issued perpetually. If earlier the licenses were issued for 5 years, currently, they have become perpetual. This means that the entrepreneurs getting licenses in 2015 will use it perpetually and will not apply for getting a license in coming years," the expert stated.

Given this, the expert expects increase in the number of entrepreneurs applying for licenses in 2016, adding that this process will stabilize since 2017.

"Thus, the measures taken in the licensing field were very important. Our calculations show that the licensing system of Azerbaijan is at the level of the licensing systems of the developed countries for the quality of steps taken in this field," Bayramov said.

The government is keen on developing the entrepreneurship activities throughout the country. In this regard, a presidential decree issued on December 21 canceled 22 types of licenses, and narrowed a list of the licenses required for doing business in Azerbaijan from 59 to 37.

Also, in early October, licensing procedures for entrepreneurship were simplified, paving the way for encouraging business transparency in the country. Moreover, the number of inspections among entrepreneurs was also reduced for two years.

Asked about the possible increase in number of the issued licenses, Head of the Public Relations Department of the Economy and Industry Ministry Abbas Aliyev said the ministry is ready and will continue to issue licenses through the ASAN service centers to entrepreneurs in 2016.

"Business entities will get licenses through the ASAN service centers without any obstacles," he noted.

Aliyev also stated that some 19,000 licenses have been issued for entrepreneurs so far. “After applying the new system, their number was decreased by 75 percent. The remaining 25 percent, which were not terminated, are considered perpetual,” he said.

Currently, the cost of the state duty for a license varies between 220 manats ($141)-11,000 manats ($7,069) depending on the type of activity. No state duty is required for the reissuance or recovery of the license.