Tag Archives: economy

Azerbaijan receives grant from China

DEC. 8 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – China has given Azerbaijan a grant of around $4.5m to boost economic relations between the two countries, media reported. China has expanded its economic and diplomatic reach across the South Caucasus significantly over the past few years.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)

IMF cuts Kazakhstan economy growth

DEC. 9 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – The IMF cut Kazakhstan’s growth rate for 2014 to 4.3% from 4.6% because of a slump in oil prices and the downturn in Russia’s sanction-hit economy. It also said Kazakhstan needed to cut more of its non-performing loans (NPLs) from its banking sector. Kazakhstan has one of the highest proportions of NPLs in the world.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)

Georgian and Armenian currencies fall

DEC. 5 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Georgian lari and the Armenian dram have fallen sharply against the US dollar. The lari hit its lowest level for 10 years and the dram its lowest level since 2006. The root cause of the collapse of the currencies is the weakening of Russia’s economy because of a collapse in oil prices and Western- imposed sanctions.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)

Putin flies to Uzbekistan for talks

DEC. 9 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – In an effort to shore up support in the former Soviet Union, Russian president Vladimir Putin flew to Uzbekistan, where he will offer the carrot of improved economic ties and debt cancellation.

Russian media said that Mr Putin will write off Uzbekistan’s $890m debt and also look to increase both energy imports from Uzbekistan and the import of agriculture machinery.

Uzbekistan and Russia have a lukewarm relationship. Uzbek president Islam Karimov is famously coy about his dealings with other former Soviet states. He has kept Uzbekistan away from the Kremlin-led Customs Union, which will morph into the Eurasian Economic Union next year, but is a keen member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, a security-economy group that is led by Beijing and Moscow.

With NATO and the West withdrawing from Afghanistan and Central Asia, perhaps Mr Karimov has decided to ally himself closer to Russia. Russia, under pressure in the West, needs all the friends it can currently muster.

Another area that Russia and Uzbekistan have been working on is labour migrants.

In November, the two countries agreed to draft a bilateral agreement to regulate Uzbek labour migrants’ economic activities in Russia.

The Uzbek authorities have previously preferred to play down labour migration but the reality is that remittances and labour migration have become a major part of Uzbekistan’s economy. In 2013, estimates said that 3m Uzbeks worked in Russia, sending home a total of $6.5b.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)

Turkmenistan to export flour

DEC. 6 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Turkmenistan plans to sell 200,000 tonnes of flour on the international market, media reported, part of its strategy to diversify its exports away from just oil and gas. Importantly, the sale may also help other Central Asian and South Caucasus countries suppress rising bread prices

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)

Kazakhs paying mostly with plastic cards

DEC. 4 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakhs are becoming more comfortable paying for products on their credit and debit cards, the research website ranking.kz said. It said that for the year to the end of October transactions using either credit or debit cards had risen by 22%. This increase should aid consumer spending.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)

Tajik remittances decline by 6%

DEC. 5 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Remittances from Russia have declined by around 6%, the head of the Tajik Central Bank, Abdujabbor Shirinov, told the IMF. Western media groups and analysts have said that the decline in income from Tajiks working in Russia and sending cash back home — a vital funding flow — had been greater.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)

Online sales increase in Azerbaijan

DEC. 8 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – The amount of transactions completed online in Azerbaijan more than doubled in the first 11 months of the year to 5.6m manat, media reported. The statistic is an indicator that Azerbaijan’s economy is maturing.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)

Tajikistan plans to boost FDI

DEC. 8 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Tajikistan continues to attempt to increase its appeal to investors, even as its investment climate looks difficult — some would say too difficult — to all but the state-affiliated companies of its political allies.

During a recent meeting with UN Secretary-General for Trade and Development (UNCTAD) Mukhisa Kituyiin in Geneva, Tajik Foreign Minister Sirodzhiddin Aslov asked UNCTAD to conduct an independent study of the country’s investment policies.

With the country’s debt at $2b according to the ministry of finance, the need for a foreign capital injection is clear. Tajikistan’s ranking in the World Bank’s Doing Business study is 167th of 189 countries with lousy scores for categories such as ‘paying taxes’ and ‘getting electricity’. Both local and foreign businessmen complain of state corruption.

Tajikistan has also applied for a sovereign credit rating for 2015. When the agencies release their verdicts next year, it could make for interesting reading.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)

Kazakh President wants Russia sanctions cut

DEC. 5 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – At a press conference in Astana with visiting French president Francois Hollande, Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev called on the West to relax sanctions against Russia imposed for its alleged support of rebel forces in the east of the country. The sanctions on Russia have had a knock-on effect on Central Asia.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)