DUSHANBE, September 28, Asia-Plus -- Mr. Craig Steffensen, Head of the CAREC Unit (CARECU or the Program Secretariat), today met here with representatives from the news agency Asia-Plus, which is one of partners to the Central Asian Gateway Project (CAG), which is co-funded  by the Central Asia Regional Economic Cooperation (CAREC) Program.  

He assessed work of the team positively and expressed readiness to continue long-term cooperation.  Having briefed on the results of the Manila meeting on transport and commerce, Mr. Steffensen offered them to take part in events dedicated to the CAREC ministerial conference that will be held in Dushanbe on November 3.   

Jamshed Mannonov, Tajikistan’s national facilitator for the CAG Project, proposed to increase a number of partners to the project through enlisting the services of organizations of countries, where the CAREC Program is being implemented.  

Johannes Linn, Special Adviser to the CAREC Program, also attended the meeting. 

Today afternoon, the CAREC representatives will hold talks with President Emomali Rahmon.  

The Central Asian Gateway project aims at facilitating development and integration in the countries of Central Asia through promoting networking among socio-economic research institutions and other development stakeholders, knowledge sharing and experience exchange focusing on the issues of good governance, regional integration and private sector development.

The Central Asian gateway  Internet website on development issues was developed in accordance with recommendations received during the International Conference on “Economic Reforms and Foreign Direct Investment in Transition Economics: Lessons Learned and Prospects fro Central Asia,” held in Tashkent in January 2003.  The Project initiators are UNDP Regional Bureau for Europe and the CIS (Slovak Republic) and the Center for Economic Research (Uzbekistan).  

Currently, the Project is implemented by AkiPress (Kyrgyzstan), Asia-Plus Media Group (Tajikistan), and Center for Economic Research (Uzbekistan) with support from the UNDP RBEC and the UNDP Country Offices in respective countries.

The Central Asian Gateway Internet portal is dedicated to the issues of socio-economic development and cooperation in Central Asia. The on-line Communities are launched to support close interaction between all parties interested in poverty reduction, economic reforms, civil society development, democratic governance and other priority directions of development in the region.  The portal provides information and various on-line opportunities for knowledge sharing and communicating for private sector, governments, international TA agencies and other organizations, civil society and academia.