Tajikistan is in third place among six member nations of the Eurasian Fund for Stabilization and Development (EFSD) in terms of a number of projects implemented in 2009-2021 under technical assistance of international financial institutions and partners for development.
282 projects were implemented in Tajikistan in 2009-2021 (18 percent of a total number of projects implemented in the EFSD member nations over the reporting period).
Technical assistance is in high demand by the countries due to the need for accelerated institutional and socioeconomic development. Projects in public administration, economic development, macroeconomics, health care, and agriculture prevail.
A working paper released by the EFSD on October 6 says Tajikistan follows Armenia (336 projects or 21.5 percent) and Kyrgyzstan (326 or 20.8 percent).
Technical Assistance of International Financial Institutions and Development Agencies in Eurasia, in particular, says the purpose of this analytical document is to review technical assistance projects (TA) implemented by international financial institutions (IFIs) and partners for development in 2009–2021 in eleven Eurasian countries, including six EFSD member nations, as well as Azerbaijan, Georgia, Mongolia, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan, with a detailed thematic and institutional breakdown. The document employs data collected by the EFSD as a part of its major initiative, EFSD Sovereign Financing Database.
Before that, there was no aggregated information on TA projects across all the institutions in the region. The EFSD database reportedly includes about 2,900 TA projects from public sources. TA projects differ significantly in duration and cost – from short-term consultations-seminars to multi-year projects accompanying structural transformations in the economy. A large number of projects testifies to the need of the countries of the region to improve skills and competencies as well as to accompany investment projects.
In terms of institutions, almost two thirds of TA projects were implemented by IFIs (65%), with the remaining one third by agencies for development (35%).
The EFSD analysts identified 15 issues of technical assistance projects. The most common in the sectoral context were public administration (709 TC projects), macroeconomics (667 projects) and economic development (238 projects). In total, they accounted for 56% of the total number of TA projects. Accordingly, on other sectoral topics – 44%. Among them, health care and agriculture stand out.
The survey notes that despite the large number of TA projects implemented, the EFSD recipient states still face a range of unresolved structural, economic, and social issues, which call for further concerted actions by the donor community.
The Eurasian Fund for Stabilization and Development (the former EURASEC Anti-Crisis Fund) is a regional financial arrangement in the amount of US$8.513 billion established by Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Tajikistan to overcome negative crisis consequences, to provide long-run sustainability and to foster economic integration of EFSD member countries. The Fund provides the following assistance to the member states: financial credits for budget support and (or) balance-of-payments support, available to governments only; investment loans, provided either to EFSD member states or to companies; and grants to finance government programs in the social sector.
