DUSHANBE, February 5, 2009, Asia-Plus — International Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group, is helping improve the investment climate in Tajikistan by getting banks, private companies, NGOs, and other stakeholders to work with the government to develop a national corporate governance code that would reflect international best practice, press release issued by FIC Dushanbe Office said.
Tajik companies that want to improve their corporate governance currently lack national guidance on how to proceed. To help address that problem, IFC’s Central Asia Corporate Governance Project last week organized a roundtable discussion that brought together government representatives and a variety of local stakeholders. The participants agreed to work together to develop a national corporate governance code that will make Tajik companies more transparent and attractive to foreign investors.
“The time has come to develop a national corporate governance code of best practice in Tajikistan,” said Vyacheslav Piyarov, a legal consultant to Agroinvestbank who participated in the discussion. “It will improve the investment climate in the country and bring internal governance of the market players to international standards. We welcome IFC, which plays an important role in this process by sharing its international expertise.”
Tahmina Nurova, team leader of the IFC advisory project, said many Tajik joint-stock companies have expressed a desire to see national corporate governance regulations raised to international standards. “The participants also discussed the code’s framework and content, and decided on the first practical steps,” she said.
In 2007, IFC launched the Central Asia Corporate Governance Project to improve practices at local joint-stock companies and banks, helping them enhance operations and increase their ability to attract financing and investment.
To date, the project has made the following achievements: consulted or trained more than 1,100 individuals from more than 300 companies in Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and the Kyrgyz Republic on improving corporate governance practices; held the first-ever training for regional educators on corporate governance in June 2008 to help develop educational curricula related to corporate governance; key participants in a working group that drafted annotated comments to the Kazakhstan Model Corporate Governance Code, which were officially adopted in July 2007; helped the Kyrgyz government to clarify director liability, shareholder rights and information disclosure in the legislation, which entered into law in June 2008; and the Kazakhstan team held the first-ever round tables on corporate governance-related legal issues that had the participation of the Kazakh Supreme Court judge, commercial court judges and practicing attorneys.
IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, creates opportunity for people to escape poverty and improve their lives. It fosters sustainable economic growth in developing countries by supporting private sector development, mobilizing private capital, and providing advisory and risk mitigation services to businesses and governments. IFC’s new investments totaled $16.2 billion in fiscal 2008, a 34 percent increase over the previous year.
