DUSHANBE, May 12, Asia-Plus  -- In Tajikistan, the volumes of compensations by the country’s insurers are much lower than insurance premiums, Ms. Sanovbar Homidova, the chairperson of the state service for insurance supervision within the Ministry of Finance (MoF), said in an interview with Asia-Plus.     

According to her, a total amount of insurance premiums, which are charged for a certain amount of insurance coverage, collected by 15 insurance companies over the first three months of this year has been 42,529,300 somonis, while amount of insurance compensations for the report port has made only 3.9 percent of the mentioned amount, reaching 1,696,700 somonis.    

Ms Homidova noted that the law rate of insurance compensations is evidence of underdevelopment of insurance market in the country and lack of congenial competition.  She noted that country’s effective law on insurance activity does not admit foreign companies to the insurance market. 

“Under this law, foreign company should not assume more than 49% ownership interest in enterprise, and therefore, foreign companies with more favorable terms cannot get into Tajikistan’s insurance market,” Homidova said, adding that the state service on insurance supervision has prepared a new bill on insurance activity.  

The income level of a major population of the country is low, and therefore, the insurance companies cannot set high insurance fee, she said.  

In the meantime, according to the service for insurance supervision, a total amount of premiums for compulsory insurance has been 5.737 million somonis over the fist quarter of this year, which is 1.1  times more than in the same period of last year.  The amount of premiums for voluntary insurance for the report period has been 36,795,300 somonis, which is two times more than in January-March 2007.