Tajik parliament ratifies pact with ADB on border service improvement

Within the framework of the Central Asia Regional Economic Cooperation (CAREC) program, the regional improvement of border service project envisages construction of appropriate infrastructure at the Gulistan checkpoint in Isfara -- a city in Sughd province in northern Tajikistan, Xinhua reports.

In particular, the project is intended to build a terminal, a bonded warehouse and other infrastructure facilities at the checkpoint to reduce registration time and speed up passage of goods, Tajikistan's Deputy Finance Minister Alamhon Naimi said at a Majlisi Namoyandagon session.

The cost of the project is estimated at 11.1 million U.S. dollars, of which 9.2 million dollars will come from the ADB grant.

The share of the Tajik government in the project will amount to 1.9 million and will be provided in the form of tax exemption, according to the deputy minister.

The project will support transport corridor development and trade facilitation in the CAREC region by reducing physical and institutional bottlenecks to the cross-border movement of goods.

The project will be implemented in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. A followup project is envisioned to include other CAREC countries.

The CAREC program is an ADB-supported initiative brought up in 1997 to encourage economic cooperation among countries in the Central Asian region.

It is a partnership of 10 countries -- Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Pakistan, China, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan -- and six multilateral development partners working to promote development through cooperation, leading to accelerated economic growth and poverty reduction.

CAREC helps Central Asia and its neighbors dig out their significant potential by promoting regional cooperation in four priority areas -- transport, trade facilitation, energy and trade policy.