KHUJAND, August 19, 2009, Asia-Plus — The number of residents of the Sughd province that have failed to repay loans to microfinance organization is increasing, Ms. Svetlana Mustakayeva, representative of the Association of Microfinance Organization of Tajikistan (AMFOT) in Sughd, said in an interview with Asia-Plus, referring the results of survey conducted by the Association to study activities of these organizations over the first seven months of this year.
According to her, 45 percent of the Sughd residents that received loans from microfinance organizations over the report period received microloans of less than US$500, 27 percent received microloans loans of US$500 to US$1,000, 25 percent received microloans of US$1,000 to US$5,000 and the remaining 3 percent received microloans of more than US$5,000 each.“
In all, microfinance organizations have served 485,368 people in northern Tajikistan since they were launched,” said Mustakayeva, “It is 22.4 percent of the overall Sughd population.”
Over the second quarter (from April 1 through June 31) of this year, microfinance organizations operating in Sughd have provided 22.9 million U.S. dollars in loans, she said. “Of this amount, 30 percent have been provided to the commercial sector, 34 percent have been provided to the livestock sector, 16 percent have gone to supporting enhancement of the agrarian sector, consume loans have constituted 13 percent, loans provided to the service sector have constituted 5 percent and loans provided to the production sector have constituted 2 percent,” the AMFOT official said.
Loan arrears have risen from 5.6 percent in the first quarter of this year to 7.6 percent, she added. According to her, one the main reasons for increasing loan arrears is decrease in labor migrants’ remittances. The other reason is the fact that microfinance organizations provide loans in somoni, binding them to the exchange rate of USD that has jumped sharply, Mustakayeva said.
