Inflation to Consume Healthcare Payrise

The Tajik government has given the lowest-paid public sector workers a significant wage increase, NBCentralAsia analysts say that the extra cash will be swallowed up by inflation.



On September 4, President Imomali Rahmon signed a decree to raise the wages of healthcare, culture and welfare staff by 50 per cent.



This is the second time public sector salaries have gone up this year, but unlike the 40 per cent rise in April which applied to all government workers, this latest decree targets those at the bottom end of the pay scale.



Average wages in Tajikistan are between 40 and 50 dollars a month. Highly qualified doctors are paid 47 somoni a month, a mere 14 US dollars. Other medical staff and the employees of libraries, theatres, museums, retirement homes and children’s homes receive 37-40 somoni or up to 11 dollars a month.



Nazira Davlatova, head of the labour ministry department that sets pay rates for the public sector, says that official calculations show that people need 55 somonis or 16 dollars a month for bare survival and 119 somonis, 35 dollars, to eat properly.



NBCentralAsia analysts say that inflation is so high that most people will not feel any benefit from the wage increase.



On September 6, Carlos Pinerua, head of the International Monetary Fund mission to Tajikistan, questioned the national statistics committee’s figure of 18.3 per cent year-on-year inflation for January to August this year. He said the real rate for the period was 9.4 per cent.



According to the Tajik labour ministry, the price of public services has gone up by 11 per cent overall. That breaks down as 60 per cent for natural gas, 35 per cent for medical treatment, six per cent for electricity and 14 per cent for water.



The head of the ministry’s welfare department, Qudratullo Qurbanov, is concerned as the rapid rise in prices, which he says will soon mean that government employees will not even be able to afford basic goods and services soon.



In legal terms, the concept of a minimum consumer basket does not exist in Tajikistan, and Qurbanov says this makes it impossible to quantify the wage level needed to satisfy minimum needs.



Despite high inflation, Firuz Saidov, head of social affairs and labour management at the Centre for Social Research, believes the wage increase will nevertheless encourage more doctors to practice in rural areas.



Rural practices are seriously understaffed because “doctors do not want to go somewhere where the pay is miserable and there are no prospects”, he said.



(NBCentralAsia draws comment and analysis from a broad range of political observers across the region.)