Tajikistan: 64% poverty, and portents for more

Three stories from the United Nations News Agency, IRIN, point to Tajikistan's poverty and resulting problems for children, families, migration, and a host of other problems that result from poverty.  All three of these articles show how difficult it is to rise from poor circumstances.  Furthermore, they show that even responsible choices by virtuous people cause these same people to be swept into unremitting economic despair.

First, Vadim at NewEurasia.net noted an article in which an eleven-year-old boy, Abduholik, describes the living conditions at home and why he is not in school.  He works as a shoe polisher in the market, earning about USD 1.35 per day, minus expenses for shoe polish.  His elder brother, fourteen-year-old Shokir, washes cars on the highway for USD 0.58 per car.  His sisters tend the house and chickens so that their mother can sell eggs and milk all day at the market.  Their father passed away in Russia due to illness and poverty while working odd jobs.

Prelude to disaster
This article puts a human face on a second, more analytical article at IRIN about child poverty in Tajikistan.  At a recent presentation I attended, UNU, Brookings, and World Bank presenters talked about “lost human capital”, in other words, irreversible loss of opportunity associated with choices of this kind.  When children drop out of school to make ends meet, they not only lose the chance of education for the present, but find that the chance to re-enter school is also gone.  They become part of the pool of unskilled labor for the rest of their lives, which is the pool of labor that generally fails to benefit from new economic opportunities.  Without intervention, this family is destined to remain poor.  When their situation is multiplied by the large number of households in the same straits, you see the economic fate of the state itself.

Further trouble flies in
In the first article presented by Vadim and linked here, Abduholik says, very simply: “There is no flour in the house.”  In a third article, IRIN is also reporting the beginning of a locust invasion in Tajikistan.  This will undoubtedly affect crop yields in wheat and other foods. 

Usually world news agencies carry stories of famine after they have already proceeded to starve entire populations and a food emergency has arisen.  Tajikistan has lost 45,000 hectares of crops already this year, and the plague is spreading.  This article is an early warning of a bad winter for Tajikistan's poor.

According to the statistics I looked up yesterday in the CIA Fact Book, 64% of Tajikistan's residents already live below the poverty line of USD 1 per day.  Life isn't so good at USD 2 per day either.

World Food Organizations that have relations with Tajikistan:
The World Food Programme, which coordinates relief efforts with Russia, others
The U.S. Government (USAID, others) although USDA 416 (b) assistance , where agricultural surpluses are used for food aid, was terminated in 2003.  It appears to have been revived, according to this 2006 newsletter, and may need to be jump-started again.

World Education Organizations that have relations with Tajikistan:
Aga Khan Foundation
USAID
The Open Society Institute

Note: I will add organizations to this list if others wish to contribute knowledge.  Thanks to Vadim for the heads-up on the IRIN articles.  It brings much that I learned this week to life.  Most of all, I hope these three IRIN articles will bring world public awareness to the plight of Tajikistan's poor.

Photos: Flickr; BBC; Environmental Agency of the United Arab Emirates