WASHINGTON. June 7. “Asia-Plus” — Tajikistan’s private sector is not dynamically developing at the moment and this is not only the government’s fault, leading economist of the World Bank for Europe and Central Asia Sudarshan Kanagaraja said in his interview with the AP.
“Businessmen, government officials and laws – these are parts of one chain. Everything is interlinked. It is impossible to develop something without good legislative basis. The problem is that your government is confident that it has to deal with all issues and settle all problems. In truth, the government is not obliged to settle all the problems. However, it should simply create conditions for resolution of such problems,” Mr. Kanagaraja has said.
He said he would recommend the Tajik government to increase the dynamics of development of private sector. “Those barriers and obstacles which exist for foreign and internal investments should be removed. Investors who wish to invest their funds into Tajikistan’s economy and concrete projects should have more freedom. They should not be blackmailed or disturbed and should not become an object of corruption,” he said.
His second recommendation concerns protection of ownership of private investors. “This right should be protected! Furthermore, governmental structures should pay attention to the increase of quality of their services provided to business and society in general. For example, in agriculture, energy management…” he said.
According to him, the third recommendation concerns financial sector. “It is in a very difficult situation now. For instance, level of “bad” debts has increased from 10 to 30%. There is a need to increase the population’s confidence in banks,” he said.
Mr. Kanagaraja also talked about the activity of the World Bank’s office in Tajikistan. “The World Bank always acts through the government and for the people and not through the people for the government. WB is not an NGO and we are not authorized to involve in any project without notifying the government of Tajikistan. We do not have such a mandate,” he said.
