Academia should be one of the key players when it comes to progress on environmental issues in any country, and Armenia is no exception. We spoke to Alen Gasparian Amirkhanian, Director of the American University of Armenia Acopian Center for the Environment, about the role that his team is playing when it comes to ensuring a greener and more circular Armenia tomorrow.
Text : Nazareth Seferian
Photo : AUA
From the early days of its establishment, the American University of Armenia (AUA) has always played a role in advancing the visibility of environmental issues as part of its educational mission. In 2008, the Environmental Conservation and Research Center became the AUA Acopian Center for the Environment (AUA ACE). Since late 2012, under the leadership of Alen Amirkhanian, one of the many topics on its radar today is green transition and the Circular Economy in Armenia.
“I would like the concept of Circular Economy to be understood as one of the approaches to green transition. The idea is to ask ourselves how we can move away from the linear approach of extracting resources, transforming them, using and then discarding them. Once we discard a resource, it’s out of our minds, but we must realize that it’s still out there.
In a linear economy, the worst case scenario is that it is actively harming the environment around us, the ‘best case’ scenario is that we have wasted a resource that still had potential value for our economy,”
Alen says, “Circular Economy is about thinking in systems and figuring out how to keep these resources circulating in our economy instead of discarding them, whether we are talking about organic materials (like food waste, animal waste, crop residues) or technological ones (metals from devices, plastics, and so on).”
When it comes to the Circular Economy and other environmental topics in Armenia, Amirkhanian acknowledges that there has been a new impetus for action in recent years. “This is very much driven by the Armenia–EU Comprehensive and Enhanced Partnership Agreement (CEPA) and international financial institutions like the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, and others. The Armenian Government has taken on certain commitments, and we have now seen the Ministry of Economy developing a Circular Economy roadmap, a green transition strategy, and so on,” he says.
He points out that one possible reason why such initiatives don’t move faster through the decision process may have to do with the policy-making process, especially the absence of tools such as economic cost-benefit analyses. “In most developed economies, policymakers analyze to see if a measure under consideration offers more benefits than costs? These would be economic costs and benefits, and not only financial ones. There has to be a net benefit. When such a systematic approach is missing, decisions may be based on financial cost-benefit, regulatory factors, and such.”
Alen adds, “When we speak of the public sector, there is a capacity issue. There are simply not enough people with the right skills and experience to conduct such relatively complex analyses. Fortunately, the international organizations and the private sector in Armenia can offer such capacity, and could have a role. Over the past 10 or 15 years, I’ve heard economic cost-benefit analysis being mentioned more often in my conversations with policymakers. Once this becomes a mandatory part of their decision-making processes, I suspect we’ll start making more rapid progress on several topics, particularly as it relates to the green agenda.”
The green transition comes with a lot of potential for Armenia. The recent adoption of the green taxonomy will facilitate new investments in the country that can have a significant impact on the economy. “But there is still work to do on this front,” Alen points out, “Green taxonomies help avoid greenwashing. With the framework government decision establishing the green taxonomy in place, we now need to work on its implementation. We need institutions that can verify if an investment meets the requirements of the taxonomy. The World Bank is working with the Ministry of Economy on this, and hopefully, this institution will be in place sometime in 2026.”
The green taxonomy is a good example of how the interests of several ministries can be aligned. The Ministry of Environment considers this a priority because it will help mitigate several environmental risks and develop the economy in a way that encourages at least the “do no harm” principle when it comes to our natural surroundings. The Ministry of Economy will be encouraged by the potential for new investment flowing into the country, which is one of its key targets. There are also important private sector players, like banks, that would like to see this process go ahead smoothly. So there seems to be enough stakeholder buy-in to justify optimism in the results that can come from the adoption and implementation of the green taxonomy in Armenia.
In addition to cost-benefit analysis, Alen believes that internal political risks are among the many considerations one must take when assessing the potential for systemic change, especially in countries like Armenia. “Let’s take Poland as an example,” he suggests, “Imagine telling the political leadership of Poland that they need to end their diesel fuel economy when the country has a coal industry that employs more than 75,000 people. How can a political leader expect to win an election after agreeing to such a decision? He stresses that an important part of this discourse is the concept of a “just transition”—namely, ensuring that the shift to a sustainable, low-carbon, and climate-resilient economy is fair, inclusive, and leaves no one behind. People are supported to make the transition, which would be done gradually.
At the same time, there is a challenge that continues to remain prominent in Armenia and other developing countries when it comes to the public sector. The pace of change is so rapid that state institutions do not have the capacity to keep up.
“Some major infrastructure investments require government support. And it’s not just about financial support—the absence of the right legislation could prove to be a significant obstacle for that infrastructure upgrade.
There is sometimes the risk of slow action in these cases, because the relevant public bodies are unable to keep up with the changes happening in the relevant sector,” Alen clarifies. Fortunately, in the case of Armenia, there is relevant expertise in the form of professionals coming through international partners, as well as in the private sector and academic institutions like the American University of Armenia.
The AUA Acopian Center for the Environment has played a significant role as a stakeholder on environmental issues in the country for several decades now. It currently works in various directions in this sector in Armenia. “Our flagship project is the Sweden-funded Green Agenda Armenia, co-implemented by the Stockholm Environment Institute. As part of this work, we’re helping various ministries and other state bodies identify the priorities for green transition. This is particularly important when it comes to the issues that currently have less support from the Government or international donors, like biodiversity conservation and soil management. This work also allows the Government to integrate these issues into their planning cycles and interim programming,” Alen elaborates.
The Center is also focused on the topic of waste management, with a very sizable Sweden-funded program, Waste Policy Armenia, which is working with the Ministry of Territorial Administration and Infrastructure to develop source separation of waste in a demonstration community and develop national guidelines. The program is also supporting the Ministry of Environment to develop the law on extended producer responsibility (EPR), a requirement of the CEPA. It is working with the Ministry of Economy on important Circular Economy topics like the development of biogas. When it comes to water management, the Center conducts both scientific research, like analyzing the nutrient loading of Lake Sevan, and social research, understanding the behaviors of communities and consumers around that crucial water resource in Armenia.
Alen and his team are also very active in youth engagement as well as working with communities to understand how behavior change occurs around environmental issues. The Center works with a very interdisciplinary group of professionals, since many of the aspects of this work require expertise and experience in business, political science, and other spheres.
When asked about Armenia’s opportunity to host the 17th Conference of the Parties (COP17) of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in October 2026, Alen was candid that there is still a lot of work to be done. “This is one of the first large-scale events with Armenia at the center of the world stage, where we have to talk about global problems, not Armenian issues. This comes with the need for a broad group of people in our country to quickly gain some basic knowledge on global environmental topics,” Alen explains. The AUA Acopian Center for the Environment, in partnership with the Ministry of Environment and the CBD Secretariat, is organizing the Road to COP17 Initiative, which includes a series of professional and technical workshops, an international scientific conference, and Biodiversity4All e-modules for a larger audience. “We also have a large-scale public information campaign on the cards, including our work with schools. There will be 20,000-30,000 people coming to Armenia, and this means that a whole range of people, from event greeters to tour operators, to taxi drivers, need to learn more about the global and Armenia’s biodiversity agenda.”
All in all, Alen Amirkhanian and his team at the Acopian Center for the Environment will have a lot on their plate over the next year or two. One significant milestone that the American University of Armenia expects in 2027 is the first cohort of graduates with bachelor’s degrees in Environmental and Sustainability Sciences. This program will play a major role in increasing the quantity and quality of professionals equipped to deal with the environmental challenges facing Armenia. “In the past 3 or 4 years, I’ve seen exponential growth in how our students understand the problems that exist, as well as the creativity they put into their solutions. We are now clearly in a place where many people understand how this is directly related to their livelihood, and I believe that this will lead to greater motivation for action,” Alen says hopefully.
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