A TASTE OF YAK IN REMOTE MURGHAB

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 DUSHANBE 001466 SIPDIS SIPDIS STATE FOR SCA/CEN E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: ECON ETRD PGOV EAID PREL TI SUBJECT: A TASTE OF YAK IN REMOTE MURGHAB REF: REF A: DUSHANBE 1456; REF B: DUSHANBE 1460 DUSHANBE 00001466 001.2 OF 002 ¶1. (U) Summary: Remote, harsh and cold, and sparsely populated by residents with hardened wind-battered facial features, Murghab sits atop an 11,778-foot plateau in an area that defines remote in eastern Tajikistan. EconOffs drove to Murghab in eastern Tajikistan in early October to see how residents live. They found a town offering little overall economic activity and surviving on a combination of yaks, remittances, and assistance programs, but benefiting very little from the flow of Chinese traders. End Summary. ¶2. (U) Murghab sits at an international crossroads with China 90 kilometers to the east, Kyrgyzstan 420 kilometers to the north, and Khorog 311 kilometers west. The 7,000 people in Murghab survive on yak and sheep herding, trading, handicrafts, and remittance income from abroad. Murghab physically resembles rural Mongolia; residents of Murghab are mostly ethnic Kyrgyz, typically former nomads who've settled there. Russian is the common language in Murghab, and both the Tajik and Kyrgyz primary schools teach Russian language to local youth. There are separate mosques for the Kyrgyz Sunni Muslims and for the Shia Pamiri Ismailis, who go to the Jamoat Khona (an Ismaili mosque). ¶3. (U) The town of Murghab is a thicket of winding streets, with small houses cobbled together from bits and pieces of wood, scrap metal, stone, mud, bricks, and discarded car parts. Residents heat their houses with coal, and use underground wells for drinking water. There are no cafes or restaurants, and by 6:00 PM the streets are empty. Since almost nothing grows in Murghab, nearly all food is imported, mostly from Kyrgyzstan. EconOffs enjoyed yak-stuffed peppers and yak soup, along with fried eggs, bread, and tea. The night sky in Murghab, unspoiled by electric lights, reveals billions and billions of stars with a creamy Milky Way overhead; a nearby Soviet astronomy facility was planned but not completed. ¶4. (U) Peeking into the stalls in Murghab's bazaar reveals small quantities of Chinese imported clothing, and small consumer and electronics goods. Transportation costs drive up local prices, with the price for a 50 kilogram sack of flour 180 somoni, 50 somoni more than in Dushanbe; recent inflation has hit local residents hard (reftel A). Local businesspeople told EconOffs October 4 that Tajik traders bring in goods from China through the Kulma Pass or through Osh in Kyrgyzstan. Fifteen Chinese trucks sat at a small truck terminal on the edge of town, deciding whether to wait more than a week for the Tajik-Chinese border to re-open on October 16, or to travel further to Osh where the can cross any time, weather permitting. [Note: The border crossing at the Kulma Pass is open 15 days, closed 15 days. End note.] The Chinese traders keep to themselves and do not use Tajik services. ¶5. (SBU) The roads to Murghab are in poor condition, and China is considering rehabilitating the road from the Kulma Pass to Khorog through Murghab. Flying to Murghab is not an option (there is no commercial air service),although there is an old, well-constructed Soviet airport a few kilometers north of Murghab on the way to Osh, Kyrgyzstan. The biggest surprise about the airport in Murghab besides its existence is the quality and length of the three-kilometer asphalt runway. The terminal has been stripped completely bare, and there is no fence preventing vehicles from driving right onto the runway. According to Suhrob Garibmamadov of the Aga Khan's Mountain Societies Development Support Program, Russian military support planes use the airport every seven to ten days. ¶6. (U) A variety of donors, particularly the Mountain Societies Development Support Program and the international non-governmental development Agency for Technical Cooperation and Development fund education and health projects, ecotourism, poverty reduction, and small business development programs. The Agency for Technical Cooperation and Development helps 104 women DUSHANBE 00001466 002.2 OF 002 sell their handicrafts in Dushanbe through a project called the Yak House. A small ecotourism project puts up adventure tourists in a local guest house or arranges yurt stays. USAID helped rehabilitate the town's mini-hydro plant (reftel B) in ¶2002. The area's single Democracy Commission grantee planned to publish a bulletin but had to cancel her grant due to local government pressure. A public association "SUDVO" works on basic poverty reduction; combining membership and donor funds, SUDVO gives yaks, goats, and sheep to extremely poor people for basic survival. Five residents of Murghab made the final round of competition for the Future Leaders Exchange Program this year. ¶7. (U) Comment: Residents of Murghab are extremely welcoming to foreigners, and blame the government for their predicament. Opportunities are few, and there has been little attempt to harness the economic benefits from transit traders, although the anticipated Chinese influx into the region has only begun to gain momentum. It is likely that economic development will largely pass by Murghab, along with most of Gorno-Badakshan's 200,000 residents. End Comment. JACOBSON