YEREVAN, January 9. /ARKA/. The banking system of Armenia possesses resources for providing loans to economy at lower interest rates, Gagik Minasyan, head of a parliament committee on financial, credit and budgetary affairs, said. He said high interest rates on loans are due, in particular, to relatively high interest rates on deposits and high inflation.

"But I think that the banking system has enough resources to lend our economy at lower interest rates," Minasyan told reporters.

He recalled that last year the government provided preferential loans for agriculture. However, according to him, this can not be now extended to other sectors.

"In general, the problem of reducing interest rates on loans should be solved through increasing competition and attraction of additional capital into the banking sector", he said.-0-