DUSHANBE, December 14, 2014, Asia-Plus -- Remittance flows from the Russian Federation to Tajikistan have reportedly declined by almost 1 percent.  

According to Russia’s central bank, 3.016 billion U.S. dollars has been sent through money transfer system to Tajikistan from the Russian Federation in the first nine months of this year, which was 29 million U.S. dollars, or almost one percent, fewer than in the same period last year.

3.045 billion U.S. dollars were reportedly remitted from Russia to banks in Tajikistan in January-September 2013.    

Over the report period, Tajikistan took the second place among the CIS nations in terms of money transfer, and Uzbekistan was in the lead in this area as 4.592 billion U.S. dollars were sent there from Russia in January-September this year.  Remittance flows from Russia to Uzbekistan have reportedly declined by 8 percent. 4.909 billion U.S. dollars were sent from Russia to Uzbekistan over the first three quarters of the last year, Russian central bank said.

Ukraine took the third place among the CIS nations in terms of money transfer over the first nine months of this year as 1.802 billion U.S. dollars have been remitted there from Russia in January-September this year – a 16 percent decline compared to the same period last year.  2.173 billion U.S. dollars were reportedly remitted from Russia to Ukraine in January-September last year.

Labor migrants still remain a critical component in the economy of Tajikistan.  Tajik government, however, stopped publishing information on the volume of remittances sent to Tajikistan.  In a report released in Dushanbe, the National Bank of Tajikistan (NBT) head Abdujabbor Shirinov revealed on July 23, 2013 that Tajikistan will no longer release cash transfer data.  According to him, the government stopped publishing information on the volume of remittances because “the migrants’ funds issue may be politicized.”