ALMATY: Turkmenistan, Central Asia’s biggest gas exporter, has restricted access to foreign currency for local companies and individuals in response to a sharp fall in export revenues, Turkmen businessmen say. Foreign currency controls would normally be a crisis measure implemented when a country is worried its foreign currency reserves are being seriously depleted.
In the case of Turkmenistan, the government does not disclose the size of its reserves, so it is difficult to gauge how serious the problem is. The central bank and finance ministry did not respond to Reuters questions on the subject. Any economic crisis could have far-reaching consequences in Turkmenistan, an ex-Soviet country that borders Iran and Afghanistan. It has been under one-party rule for 25 years.
Turkmenistan has long relied on gas supplies to Russia as its main source of hard currency revenue. Moscow halted purchases in January after sharply reducing them last year in a pricing dispute. Total Turkmen exports dropped 38.5 percent last year and were down a further 41.5 percent in the first quarter, the most recent period for which official data is available.
Late last year the central bank stopped selling foreign currency to local businesses, said one Turkmen entrepreneur who spoke on condition of anonymity because he feared official retribution for speaking openly about the issue. Foreign exchange operations are now handled by commercial banks which have a varying degree of access to foreign currency, the businessman said.
He said companies working on priority projects, such as the construction of the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline, were still able to access foreign currency. Another project moving at full steam is the construction of facilities for the 2017 Asian Indoor and Martial Arts Games, a matter of prestige for the Ashgabat government.
For anyone else, finding dollars or euros has become a tough task. Another Turkmen businessman, also speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters that after requesting $10,000 from his bank, he would only get $500. The restrictions on businesses accessing foreign currency have not been previously reported. Turkmenistan’s central bank forwarded all requests for comment to one official who could not be reached by telephone despite repeated calls over several days. The Finance Ministry said it had no information on the matter.
