Foreign students alone bring 300 million GEL into the budget annually, and more than 10,000 jobs have been created in Georgia thanks to foreign students, - this was stated by Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze during his interpellation hearing in Parliament.

According to the Prime Minister, refusing this would be wrong from the perspective of the country’s economic interests.

“As for the proportion of foreign citizens living in Georgia by the basis of stay and type of activity - 35,000 students hold study residence permits in Georgia. Additionally, 2,000 students are present on other grounds, with other types of residence permits in Georgia. Out of 37,000 students, 35,040 have been granted study residence permits. The share of study residence permits in the total figure is 32.65%.

As for the education sector specifically - how important the presence of foreign students is for Georgia - I want to share the economic data with you. We have already spoken about the fact that the contribution of foreign students to Georgia’s economy is 1.2 billion GEL. Accordingly, as a result of this alone, 300 million GEL enters our budget every year - solely due to the presence of foreign students, which is a very large figure. We believe that refusing this would be wrong from the perspective of the country’s economic interests. You remember that specific entities, for example USAID, used to ‘gift’ us 100 million dollars a year, which in reality was not spent on the country’s development at all, let alone entering the budget. Foreign students alone bring 300 million GEL into the budget every year, and more than 10,000 jobs have been created in Georgia thanks to foreign students. Therefore, we believe that there is neither a need nor expediency to reconsider this,” - stated the Prime Minister.