DEC. 22 2014, (The Conway Bulletin) — In a televised address, Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev said he had a plan to counter falling oil prices even if they fell below $40/barrel. Oil prices have now halved from their height last summer to around $50/barrel. Kazakhstan has been building up a reserve of cash to deal with a slump.
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(News report from Issue No. 213, published on Jan. 7 2015)
DEC. 18 2014, (The Conway Bulletin) — The European Parliament in Strasbourg ratified an associated deal with Georgia which deepens economic integration. The deal is important to Georgia because it moves it closer to its aim of joining the EU. At the same time the breakaway region of South Ossetia announced it wanted a stronger union with Russia.
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(News report from Issue No. 213, published on Jan. 7 2015)
JAN. 1 2015, (The Conway Bulletin) — Turkmenistan has slashed its subsidies for petrol, despite a large drop in the cost of oil, media reported. Officials in Turkmenistan have previously said that they are looking to reduce various government subsidies. Reducing subsidies, especially for petrol, can generate resentment.
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(News report from Issue No. 213, published on Jan. 7 2015)
JAN. 4 2015, (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan may have serious problems making its national budget work with oil prices dropping below $50/barrel, media reported (Jan. 4). The government’s budget estimates are calculated at oil costing $90/barrel. Oil revenues directly contribute over half the government’s revenue.
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(News report from Issue No. 213, published on Jan. 7 2015)
DEC. 8 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Bread prices have begun to rise for the first time since March, Armenian media reported. Armenia’s economy has been hit by the downturn in Russia’s economy. Commentators said that the rise in bread prices was directly attributable to an increase in the price of flour.
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(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)
DEC. 8 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – China has given Azerbaijan a grant of around $4.5m to boost economic relations between the two countries, media reported. China has expanded its economic and diplomatic reach across the South Caucasus significantly over the past few years.
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(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)
DEC. 9 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – The IMF cut Kazakhstan’s growth rate for 2014 to 4.3% from 4.6% because of a slump in oil prices and the downturn in Russia’s sanction-hit economy. It also said Kazakhstan needed to cut more of its non-performing loans (NPLs) from its banking sector. Kazakhstan has one of the highest proportions of NPLs in the world.
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(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)
DEC. 5 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Georgian lari and the Armenian dram have fallen sharply against the US dollar. The lari hit its lowest level for 10 years and the dram its lowest level since 2006. The root cause of the collapse of the currencies is the weakening of Russia’s economy because of a collapse in oil prices and Western- imposed sanctions.
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(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)
DEC. 9 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – In an effort to shore up support in the former Soviet Union, Russian president Vladimir Putin flew to Uzbekistan, where he will offer the carrot of improved economic ties and debt cancellation.
Russian media said that Mr Putin will write off Uzbekistan’s $890m debt and also look to increase both energy imports from Uzbekistan and the import of agriculture machinery.
Uzbekistan and Russia have a lukewarm relationship. Uzbek president Islam Karimov is famously coy about his dealings with other former Soviet states. He has kept Uzbekistan away from the Kremlin-led Customs Union, which will morph into the Eurasian Economic Union next year, but is a keen member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, a security-economy group that is led by Beijing and Moscow.
With NATO and the West withdrawing from Afghanistan and Central Asia, perhaps Mr Karimov has decided to ally himself closer to Russia. Russia, under pressure in the West, needs all the friends it can currently muster.
Another area that Russia and Uzbekistan have been working on is labour migrants.
In November, the two countries agreed to draft a bilateral agreement to regulate Uzbek labour migrants’ economic activities in Russia.
The Uzbek authorities have previously preferred to play down labour migration but the reality is that remittances and labour migration have become a major part of Uzbekistan’s economy. In 2013, estimates said that 3m Uzbeks worked in Russia, sending home a total of $6.5b.
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(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)
DEC. 6 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Turkmenistan plans to sell 200,000 tonnes of flour on the international market, media reported, part of its strategy to diversify its exports away from just oil and gas. Importantly, the sale may also help other Central Asian and South Caucasus countries suppress rising bread prices
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(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)
