DUSHANBE, October 12, Asia-Plus -- Olimjon Bobokalonov, the deputy director of Tajikistan’s Center for Strategic Studies, told a news conference in Dushanbe on October 11 that labor migrants’ remittances to Tajikistan are one of reasons for increase in prices of products in Tajikistan.   

Over the first six months of this year alone, labor migrants have remitted some 600 million US dollars to banks in Tajikistan for their relatives,” said the deputy director, “But money are not left in banks; migrants’ relatives issue goods against the remitted money that, in turn, leads to shortage of products on markets and as a result increase in prices.”   

Besides, local entrepreneurs realizing that people have considerable cash assets on their hands deliberately overprice goods, Bobokalonov said.   

He also named world market trends such as rising prices of energy resources and grain, as well as domestic rise in electricity prices as factors that have also led to increase in prices of a number of basic food products in the country.