DUSHANBE, March 31, 2015, Asia-Plus — Labor migrants still remain a critical component in the economy of Tajikistan.
Meanwhile, remittance flows from the Russian Federation to Tajikistan have reportedly declined by almost 8 percent.
According to Russia’s central bank, 3.831 billion U.S. dollars (USD) were sent through money transfer system to Tajikistan from the Russian Federation last year, which was 324 million USD, or almost 8 percent, fewer compared to 2013.
In 2014, Tajikistan took the second place among the CIS nations in terms of money transfer, and Uzbekistan was in the lead in this area as 5.581 billion USD were sent there from Russia last year, Russian central bank said.
Ukraine reportedly took the third place among the CIS nations in terms of money transfer last year as 2.246 billion USD were remitted there from Russia over the report period.
We will recall that 4.155 billion USD were remitted to banks in Tajikistan from Russia in 2013, which was 45 million USD fewer than in 2012.
The National Bank of Tajikistan (NBT) says 89.1 percent of remittances from Russia to Tajikistan were sent in Russian rubles (RR), 10.8 percent in USD, and only 0.1 percent in Euros.
Specialists from Tajik central bank attribute the decline in remittance flows to unprecedented fall in the international oil prices and sanctions imposed by the Western countries on Russia, which is the main destination country for Tajik migrant workers and one of major trading partners of Tajikistan.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) forecasts that dollar remittance flows to Tajikistan may decline by approximately 30 percent this year compared to 2014.
An article published in
The Guardian
in January this year notes according to the World Bank, 42 percent of Tajikistan’s economy rely on remittances.
Last year’s remittance flows to Tajikistan were estimated to account for 45 percent of country’s gross domestic product, which stood at 45.6 billion somoni (equivalent to 8.6 billion USD) in 2014.
