#198: God Forsaken Country

My blogging hiatus of 2 weeks is explained by traveling in Kyrgyzstan (1305 kms in 4 days) and amount of work that had gathered while I was traveling. It is interrupted by some worrying tendencies in the country.

Because of an unusually harsh winter this year, Kyrgyzstan had used up a lot of water in our dams to produce enough electricity that the government decided to introduce measures to accumulate water in dams by regularly switching off of electricity around the country.

Bishkek, which by is producing almost 40% of country's GDP, is fortunately not being much affected by this. Power is cut off from midnight to 5 am daily and some neighborhoods have power cut off during the day for couple of hours. The government decided not to publish the schedule of when and which areas of Bishkek will not have electricity because it is afraid that powerlines might be stolen and stores and offices might be robbed when there is not electricity.

However, everywhere else the electricity is turned on only in the morning and in the evening for people to make breakfast and dinner and watch some TV. I was meeting with a radio station in Karakol, Issykkul, and they complained they could not air their programs during the day because they don't have power generators to feed the radio station and the transmitters. And they are losing income from advertising. I am sure it is of bigger concern for companies using bigger machinery who have to cope with this.

In addition, the government this week decided to increase the price of electricity by at least 11.3% (from 0.62 to 0.69 KGS for a kilowatt-hour) for ordinary citizens, while companies might be charged 28% more. It also decided to increase fees for heat and hot water, but has not published the details of the increase, although some are saying it will be a 150% increase. The Bishkek City Council also decided today to increase fees for public transportation by 60% for daytime and 100% for nighttime (from 5.00 to 8.00 and 10.00 respectively). All these increases will come into force starting from July 1, 2008.

All in all, the Kyrgyz economy is not in the best shape. The government, at least Economic Development Minister Japarov, seems to understand it and is predicting an inflation of 19-25% in 2008.