In his annual address to both chambers of parliament, Tajik President Emomali Rahmon today proposed to launch a two-year-moratorium on inspection of industrial production facilities
Speaking at the session, the head of state, in particular, dwelled on economic challenges facing Tajikistan.
Thus, Rahmon expressed dissatisfaction with realization of the country’s export potential, pointing to the necessity of increasing the production of export goods.
“Since 1992, more than 217 state investment projects have been implemented in the country and utilization of funds has been 88-90 percent. In 2014, foreign direct investment in the country’s economy amounted to some 16 billion somoni and the utilization of funds was only 50 percent,” the president noted.
In this connection, he ordered officials to report on the results of work on attraction and utilization of investments as well as increase in production of export goods semiannually.
The head of state also proposed to exempt the imported raw materials from the value added tax (VAT) and customs duties in order to promote production of final goods in the country.
“We should seek to industrialize our country and we have all the opportunities to do this,” Rahmon said, proposing to declare the rapid industrialization the fourth national goal.
“It is necessary to bring industry’s share in the total volume of country’s gross domestic product (GDP) to 22 percent by 2030,” Rahmon noted
During the address to the joint session of both chambers of parliament, the president spoke about his professed concern for the frequency of raids on private enterprises, saying it was cramping the development of the business community.
The head of state proposed to launch a two-year-moratorium on inspection of industrial production facilities for the period of 2019-2020.
Recall, Tajikistan’s lower house (Majlisi Namoyandagon) of parliament on February 7 this year supported president’s initiative on introducing a two-year moratorium on inspection of privately-owned industrial production facilities.
President Rahmon signed a decree aimed at creating a favorable climate for the development of productive entrepreneurship on January 16, 2018.
Under the moratorium decree proposed by the president to the parliament, tax officials, prosecutors, the auditing chamber and anticorruption officials and the National Bank are still allowed to run checks. Checks could only go ahead when there was a suspicion that consumer rights were somehow being violated. The moratorium extends only to production facilities, not other types of enterprises.
