TAJIKISTAN'S NORTH GETS BIGGER SLICE OF SMALL PIE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 DUSHANBE 001434 SENSITIVE SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: ECON PREL ENRG PGOV TI SUBJECT: TAJIKISTAN'S NORTH GETS BIGGER SLICE OF SMALL PIE REF: A. DUSHANBE 1364 ¶B. DUSHANBE 1348 ¶C. DUSHANBE 846 DUSHANBE 00001434 001.2 OF 004 ¶1. (SBU) Summary: Separated from the rest of Tajikistan by a formidable mountain range, and surrounded on three sides by an unfriendly Uzbekistan, Sughd faces a particular set of difficulties. Chief among these is finding enough energy for its agricultural, residential, and industrial needs. The recent completion of the South-North line linking most of Sughd with Tajikistan's main energy grid provides more energy security, but no more energy. It may give Rahmon some leverage to manipulate water supplies to Uzbekistan. The government sees energy at the state level, some say, ignoring or even hindering small-scale efforts. Historically Tajikistan's most developed region, Sughd hopes to rejuvenate its decaying industry by launching a free economic zone. Despite some attractive incentives, however, the zone is unlikely to bring in heavy foreign investment soon. For the foreseeable future, agriculture will be Sughd's dominant sector. A reduction in cotton harvesting indicates that government decrees giving farmers freedom to plant the crop of their choice are working. Other reforms, such as granting land-use rights and resolving existing cotton debt, are more problematic. End summary. ENERGY IN THE NORTH: POWER TO THE PEOPLE? ¶2. (U) Separated from the rest of Tajikistan by a formidable mountain range, and surrounded on three sides by an unfriendly Uzbekistan, Sughd faces a particular set of difficulties. Chief among these is finding enough energy for its agricultural, residential, and industrial needs. On November 29, 2009, the 500 kV "South-North" electrical transmission line linking Tajikistan's northern and southern energy grids was completed. For the first time, Khujand and the rest of Sughd Province could get electricity directly from the southern grid without routing it through Uzbek power lines. Uzbekistan officially pulled out of the Central Asian Unified Power System on December 1, although Tashkent said it would maintain electricity supplies to Sughd as long as necessary (ref A). In the past, Sughd had some of the most severe winter energy rationing in the country, with some areas officially receiving only two hours a day but in fact receiving nothing at all. Last year embassy staff were unable to reach contacts in Isfara, for example, because they had no power to charge mobile telephones. Sughd's only power plant is the Qairaqqum hydroelectric station to the northeast of Khujand. Its maximum output is 126 Megawatts (MW),only enough to provide power to major strategic resources. By contrast, the Nurek hydroelectric station, which provides nearly three-quarters of Tajikistan's power, is rated at 3,000 MW, although during winter it averages much less. ¶3. (U) This year the situation is much better. Power rationing began in outlying areas in early November, rather than September. Khujand is receiving power 24 hours a day, although, as in most of the country, voltage dips during peak usage periods. While last year only the very center of Khujand was initially provided with round-the-clock electricity -- although in fact rationing was ultimately imposed even there -- this winter the 24-hour energy supplies have been extended outward to include areas to the north of the city as well as the airport town of Chkalov to the southeast. Areas outside of Khujand appear to receive between six and ten hours a day. Kurbon Turaiev said his home town of Istravshan receives two or three hours of electricity in the morning, and five or six hours in the evening, usually until 11 p.m. ¶4. (U) While everyone, even those generally critical of the government, seems proud and enthusiastic about the South-North line, experts acknowledged that this year's improved energy situation has more to do with the heavy spring and summer rains than with improvements in the grid. Parviz Akramov, head of the UNDP office in Khujand, said hydroelectric reservoirs throughout the country were filled to the top this year, unlike last year, when drought kept water levels low. This fall's warmer weather in the north has kept power usage for heating down. The South-North line has not played much of a role because the north already received energy from the south prior to the completion of the line. Until now, Tajikistan sent energy from its central grid to the north via Uzbek transmission lines -- exporting energy from Nurek to Uzbekistan, then re-importing the same amount into Sughd. While overall energy deliveries from Uzbekistan were erratic and suffered from political machinations, this basic exchange tended to operate without incident. (Some we spoke to suggested it was spared because rail and natural gas lines linking Tashkent with the Uzbek Andijon region continue to cross Tajik territory in Sughd, giving the region some leverage.) Nevertheless, Sughd could only import from Uzbekistan the amount being exported from DUSHANBE 00001434 002.2 OF 004 Tajikistan in the south. So the north has always been reliant on flows from the southern grid. WHAT LEVERAGE DOES TAJIKISTAN HAVE WITH UZBEKISTAN? ¶5. (SBU) There were different views about President Rahmon's response to the Uzbek energy pullout by threatening to withhold water for energy generation rather than letting it flow downstream to irrigate fields (ref B). Nehmatullo Mirsaidov, Deputy Editor-in-Chief of the Varorud newspaper, said Tajikistan had very limited capacity to alter water flow in the north. The Qairaqqum reservoir, while large in surface area, had a volume of only 3.5 billion cubic meters, and its crumbling banks needed massive restoration. Finally, Tajikistan needed to keep the water in the Syr Darya flowing through the Qairaqqum power station to generate electricity. Any real change would depend on what Kyrgyzstan did further upstream at the Toktagul hydropower station, with its 19 billion cubic meter capacity. ¶6. (SBU) According to independent journalist Tilav Rasulzoda, however, even a small disruption in water flow to Uzbekistan could have serious effects, since Uzbek agriculture can survive without water for only three or four days during the growing season. Both journalists speculated that Tajikistan would ultimately wind up employing a model where it sold water to Uzbekistan. Although simply selling water violates international conventions, Mirsaidov said a workaround would be found where the Uzbeks paid not for water, per se, but for the service of maintaining the upstream reservoirs and delivery systems. This issue would grow in importance if the Tajiks dusted off a Soviet-era project to divert water from the Zeravshan valley, in southern Sughd, through some high mountains to help irrigate the north. GOVERNMENT IGNORES SMALL ENERGY SOLUTIONS ¶7. (SBU) Viktor Lyadskiy of the Association of Enterprises and Cooperatives, based in Chkalov, complained that the government, in its zeal to promote large, state-led projects, was penalizing smaller, more cost-effective energy solutions. A colleague of his, for example, was producing small, 75-kilowatt hour hydropower generators made from old Soviet water pumps. The generators cost 50,000 somoni alone, or 350,000 with set-up and installation, and could be used to power several households. Lyadskiy said, however, that government officials refused to license the generators, and sometimes threatened to destroy them if they were set up without licensing. He had no idea why authorities were so resistant to the idea, but said it was foolish. A further problem affecting not only small hydro, but all other alternative energy production, was a lack of financing. Lyadskiy said there was no effective way to get a loan to establish a windmill, solar system, biogas generator, or hydroelectricity station. He was unaware that microfinance lenders such as FINCA are willing to lend money for small-scale energy solutions. FREE ECONOMIC ZONE: PEOPLE TO THE POWER? ¶8. (U) Responding to a 2004 law, Tajikistan recently established two free economic zones (FEZs),one in Panj, on the southern border with Afghanistan, and the other in Khujand. The Sughd FEZ, which officially began operating in June, covers 320 hectares, a third of which consists of the remnants of a 1970s Soviet industrial park and the rest of which is empty land. The head of the Sughd FEZ, Anvar Yaqubov, described incentives designed to attract both foreign and domestic investors to the zone. Rent in the FEZ is a simple $1 per square meter of land per year; the 32 pre-existing enterprises in the zone were offered leases of $0.25 per year. Manufacturing enterprises are required to invest a minimum of $500,000 to enter the zone, but other companies -- import/export firms, technology companies, financial institutions, etc. -- are exempted from this minimum investment. All occupants pay no taxes (except social taxes for employees) for the first seven years, and their products and inputs are exempt from customs duties. The FEZ has its own electrical substation, and Yaqubov said that regional authorities would maintain continuous power supplies to the zone -- another incentive for potential investors. Companies pay prevailing rates for electrical and other utilities. In addition, Sughd contained abundant supplies of raw materials such as marble, quartzite for glass-making, and stone for cement, to support manufacturing. Yaqubov said a 7-kilometer rail line connecting the FEZ to the existing network was included in the terms of reference for the nearby prospective Bolshoy Konimansur silver mine. ¶9. (SBU) Yaqubov said a number of foreign delegations had visited the Sughd FEZ, and many of them had expressed interest DUSHANBE 00001434 003.2 OF 004 in the zone, although so far none had established themselves there. The Sughd FEZ had an advantage over Panj in that it a good deal of pre-existing infrastructure -- warehouses, machine shops, utility hookups, equipment -- that a potential investor could purchase or rent. A short walk through the "occupied" part of the FEZ, however, might leave a potential foreign investor unconvinced. The area is dominated by the rusting hulks of Soviet-era warehouses, most of them abandoned. Even those with some activity had holes in their roofs and floors, were strewn with abandoned machinery, and featured enough loose wiring to give an OSHA inspector an embolism. A domestic manufacturer of insulated wiring and PVC pipes that located to the zone in 2005 (before it achieved its current status) chose to build a new workshop rather than occupy an existing structure. ¶10. (U) Yaqubov recognized that improvements were necessary to attract foreign investors. Chief among these was building a customs post in the zone to handle imports and exports on site. He said the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) was considering assisting with the $3.95 million project. Next, the FEZ needed better security, to prevent pilferage and to ensure that smugglers did not take advantage of the zone's customs-free status. Securing the FEZ's 9.7-kilometer perimeter with a sound wall, adequate lighting, and surveillance equipment would cost several million dollars. Noting that 90% of Tajikistan's food processing occured in Sughd, Yaqubov said the next step should be to build a refrigerated warehouse. He also wanted to establish a "business incubator" in the FEZ to provide education and training. Finally, Yaqubov said a building on the site should be used as a "one-stop shop" for business registration, licensing, inspection, and other functions. AGRICULTURE: ONE STEP FORWARD, A COUPLE STEPS SIDEWAYS ¶11. (U) Although Sughd, despite its long years of decay, is still more industrially developed than the south, agriculture is its most important sector. Several experts confirmed that there had been a precipitous decline in cotton planting, indicating the government's commitment to giving farmers the freedom to grow the crops of their choice was effective. According to Akramov at the UNDP, at least 20% less land had been planted with cotton this year compared to last; Abdusattor Haidarov, head of the independent agricultural services company Sughd Agroservice, put the figure even higher. Akramov said the market had a role to play in the declining cotton production, since the price of raw cotton on the Liverpool exchange had dropped by nearly a factor of two to $1,200 a ton. Increased cotton production in China had been partly responsible for driving down the price. Haidarov, Akramov, and Anvar Khoshimov, Director of the agricultural NGO Zar Zamin, said cotton traditionally has been a less important crop in Sughd than in the south -- due both to climate factors as well as Sughd farmers' greater experience with other crops. This year farmers planted more onions, corn, and wheat. But many farmers had planned poorly, Akramov said. Remembering that onions had fetched prices as high as $0.45 a kilogram last year, many farmers had overplanted the crop this year, and the resulting glut has pushed prices as low as 8 cents a kilo. ¶12. (SBU) Khoshimov confirmed that students have not been sent into the fields to harvest cotton this year, although he said some government employees had been furloughed to pick cotton. He acknowledged an apparent paradox: while it appears that freedom to farm is being extensively implemented, news reports and government press releases still speak in terms of cotton "targets" down to the sub-regional level. According to the Ministry of Agriculture in Dushanbe, the targets were in fact merely "projections." Calling this a disingenuous answer, Khoshimov explained that while the national government's commitment to freedom to farm appeared real (he emphasized that there were financial reasons for this),the change in approach had been slow to work down to the local level, where authorities still often insisted on cotton production. Khoshimov's NGO was promoting the cultivation of organic cotton, which he said had great promise for Tajikistan. While harvests were somewhat lower than traditional cotton cultivation, the crop could be sold for prices 20% higher. Furthermore, production costs were lower because farmers did have to buy industrial fertilizers. ¶13. (SBU) All three experts acknowledged that other government agricultural reforms would take much more time to implement. Akramov said that there was a lot of institutional resistance to granting farmers land-use rights. (In Tajikistan all land is owned by the state, but a system is being developed to give farmers the right to own, buy, and sell limited-term leases to land.) Most farms, regardless of their official juridical status, continue to operate along Soviet lines, and real land-use rights would threaten current operators' control and DUSHANBE 00001434 004.2 OF 004 profits. Khoshimov said, however, that slow movement on the land-use question was not necessarily a bad thing. Tajik farmers had a long way to go psychologically before getting used to the idea that they were responsible for land in the same way they may be responsible for houses or cars. He feared a hasty de facto privatization of land would lead to many uneducated farmers making unproductive use of their land. ¶14. (SBU) Haidarov spoke favorably about the government plan to resolve $548 million in outstanding agricultural debt owed by farmers to the government and private cotton investors (ref C), but he had serious worries about its implementation. While the $435 million owed to the government would simply be forgiven, the plan is to offer private lending institutions government bonds to compensate them for writing off the $113 million in debt they are collectively owed. Sughd Agroservice owns $400,000 of this original debt, which Haidarov said had grown to $550,000 with interest. He was concerned that without previous experience selling and managing bonds, such government commitments ran the risk of becoming worthless scrip. Such a collapse could destroy agricultural financing. He had concerns on the lower level as well. A farmer who struggled to repay his loans -- for instance by selling a car or other property -- was effectively penalized for his conscientiousness and hard work when his neighbor who did not make the same effort simply had his debts forgiven. Haidarov said that this unfairness would be mitigated somewhat, however, when those farmers sought new loans: the hard worker would be looked upon much more favorably by lending institutions. COMMENT: INTEGRATION AND STAGNATION ¶15. (SBU) Long separated from the rest of Tajikistan by geography and, to some extent, culture, Sughd is being steadily integrated with the south. Until recently Sughd looked more to Tashkent (the two were in the same region in the early Soviet period) for its power, transportation links, and market access. The completion of the South-North power line and the ongoing construction of the highway linking Dushanbe and Khujand are changing this. Despite their misgivings about southerners, those we spoke to in the north were proud of these developments. But for all the enthusiasm, a fundamental truth has not changed: while more of Tajikistan can take a piece of the national pie, that pie remains as small as it ever was. Government efforts to expand that pie, by increasing overall energy production, luring foreign investors, and improving agriculture, are still a long way off -- if not a pie in the sky. End comment. GROSS