DUSHANBE, September 22, 2009, Asia-Plus  -- Allegations by some experts that the global financial crisis has come to an end do not correspondent to the facts, Firouz Saidov, an official with the Center for Strategic Studies, said in an interview with Asia-Plus.

According to him, the crisis reached its bottom only in July-August this year and gradual growth in world economy is just beginning; however, it does not mean that the crisis is behind, because at least two or three years are required for full rehabilitation of world economy.

A senior expert from Tajik think tank noted that a certain progress was to be observed on the way of overcoming the crisis in Tajikistan; however, “there is no cause for being calm.”  “International price of primary aluminum has risen a little lately and the international price of cotton fiber is expected to rise and according to official data, labor migrants’ remittances will also increase to a certain degree,” Saidov noted.

The expert added that the crisis had played a positive role in some way for Tajikistan’s economy.  “According to our data, only 12 percent of local small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) had invested in production of goods in Tajikistan before the crisis, while over the past six-seven months, this figure has increased to 25 percent,” Saidov stressed.

We will recall that the global economic crisis, which has hit Central Asia hard, was one of major topics of the second EU-Central Asia Ministerial Conference, which took place in Brussels on September 15.  In an interview published on the website of the EU Council of Ministers ahead of the Brussels meeting, the EU special representative for the region, Pierre Morel, noted that the relatively open economy of Kazakhstan has been particularly hard hit.  Tajikistan is suffering from a serious drop in remittances sent home by workers in Russia and elsewhere.  Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, with their closed economies, have fared "considerably better," Morel said.