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Opening up Tajikistan

Opening up Tajikistan

Tajikistan’s EITI Council published its first EITI Report covering 2014 data on 27 October 2015. The report documents USD 87 million of government revenue from the extractive sector with more than 90% generated by mining. Although the sector represents only 4 % of government budget in 2014, the extractive sector was responsible for 23 % of that year’s exports.

“EITI is an important step towards improving transparency in the extractive sector in Tajikistan,” said the deputy Head of the Institute of Geology and a member of the EITI Council Markhabo Abdullaeva. The Institute of Geology has been closely working with the EITI since its establishment in Tajikistan and this teamwork has been proved to bring fruitful results: you will see the annex with the license cadastre in the report. This information has not previously been available to the public in such detail.”

The publication of the report was seen by civil society as a welcome step by the government to open up. “The EITI has enabled civil society in Tajikistan to have a larger say in how the extractive sector is governed.” said the CSO representative at the EITI Council Todjinisso Azizova. “In the case of Tajikistan, we are able to see extractive data in one report, which was not possible earlier. Though there is much room for improvement, our first EITI Report signals of the Tajikistan’s willingness to bring about greater transparency to our extractive sector.”

The report gives an overview of the extractive sector including data on proven and forward reserves. It also provides a brief description of the exploration activities in 2014. The members of the EITI Council experienced some difficulties with the first report as some companies were reluctant to share information. “This is the first time we are participating in such reporting” said the company representative at the EITI Council Aziz Toshmatov. “We have yet to improve our systems and the first reporting exercise has taught us new ways of working together. We hope that government-to-company communication will only improve from now on.”

Three of the 14 companies in the EITI Report are partially state-owned. Considerable details related to these companies are missing from the report due to the currently weak government systems for recording all company payments.  To this end, the Independent Administrator makes important recommendations for improvements.

A presentation of the report to the wider public will take place on 25 November 2015 in Dushanbe. For more information on the EITI in Tajikistan visit the EITI country page or get in touch with the EITI team.

 

Countries
Tajikistan