Azernews.Az

By Sara Rajabova

Asian Development Bank will allocate more than $ 240 million to Tajikistan to implement its anti-crisis program.

Tajik President Emomali Rahmon met on March 18 with Executive Director of the ADB Umesh Kumar to discuss current issues and prospects of cooperation between Tajikistan and the influential financial institution, the press service of the Tajik president said.

During the discussions, much attention was paid to the development of a 5-year ADB-Tajikistan Partnership Strategy - 2016-2020.

The strategy provisions for the allocation of $240 million ADB funds for Tajikistan in 2015-2017 as an assistance aid-package to implement the anti-crisis program of this Central Asian country.

Given the increasing negative impact of external factors on the economy of Tajikistan, the sides focused on the possibility of increasing ADB assistance to Tajikistan.

Tajikistan has one of the lowest per capita GDP among the 15 former Soviet republics. The civil war in 1992-1997 severely damaged an already weak economic infrastructure and caused a sharp decline in industrial and agricultural production.

Because of a lack of employment opportunities in Tajikistan, more than one million Tajik citizens work abroad - roughly 90 percent in Russia - supporting families in Tajikistan through remittances.

Tajikistan’s Ministry of Labor, Employment and Migration has recently announced that more than 83 thousand Tajiks had been forced to leave their country to look for a job abroad in the past two months alone.

A large majority of labor migrants, approximately 82 thousand, departed for Russia, and around 1 thousand – to Kazakhstan.

The number of Tajik labor migrants in Russia is nearly 1.2 million people, according to the Russian Federal Migration Service.

The economic slump in Russia also negatively affected the Central Asia’s poorest country, which is heavily dependent on agricultural exports and remittances from Russia.

Lower inflows of remittances due to the economic slowdown in Russia have translated into lower domestic demand and slower growth in services and housing construction.

Economic growth in Tajikistan remained robust at 6.7 percent in the first half of 2014, though less than the 7.5 percent recorded in the same period of 2013, according to ADB report.

The report said the remittance inflows declined slightly in the first half of 2014, as growth slowed in Russia, but are expected to remain strong enough to continue fueling growth through private consumption.

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Sara Rajabova is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @SaraRajabova

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