Government-by-Government Assessments: Tajikistan
During the review period, the government made its executive budget proposal, enacted budget, and end-of-year report widely and easily accessible to the general public, including online. Information on debt obligations was not made public in a reasonable period of time. The budget documents did not provide a substantially complete picture of the government’s planned expenditures. Budget documents lacked detail regarding expenditures for ministries and agencies and did not identify allocations to, earnings from, or debt holdings of state-owned enterprises. The budget broke down revenue by source but did not identify natural resource revenues. Significant, large state-owned enterprises did not have publicly available audited financial statements. The government maintained significant off-budget accounts. Military and intelligence budgets were not approved by the parliament nor subject to civilian oversight. The supreme audit institution, which meets international standards of independence, made only summary information of its reports of the government’s accounts publicly available. The criteria and procedures by which the national government awards natural resource contracts or licenses were specified in law but did not appear to be followed in practice. Basic information on natural resource extraction awards was not publicly available. Tajikistan’s fiscal transparency would be improved by:
- making current information on debt obligations, including debts of state-owned enterprises guaranteed by the government, publicly available;
- producing substantially complete and sufficiently detailed budget documents;
- including allocations to, earnings from, and debt holdings of state-owned enterprises in budget documents;
- making audited financial statements of significant, large state-owned enterprises publicly available;
- subjecting military and intelligence budgets and all off-budget accounts to adequate oversight and audit;
- making the supreme audit institution’s full reports publicly available;
- following applicable laws and regulations in practice for awarding natural resource extraction contracts and licenses; and
- making basic information on natural resource extraction awards publicly available.