Tajikistan
In Tajikistan, Oxfam's focus is on sustainable livelihoods, health, disaster preparedness, and improving supplies and sources of food and clean water.
Adapting to climate change
The people of Tajikistan are experiencing the impacts of climate change:
- More frequent droughts and heightened extreme weather conditions are hitting poor communities, eroding their resilience
- The country’s glaciers are melting, bringing the dangerous prospect of future water shortages and potential disputes in the wider region
How Oxfam is helping
We are working with local partners to help vulnerable communities in rural Tajikistan adapt to climatic extremes through improving access to water, providing training in agricultural techniques and promoting disaster preparedness.
In Vose District, South Tajikistan, Oxfam has a programme to help people build energy efficient solar greenhouses so that households are able to increase their produce throughout the year and secure a more sustainable income.
![Woman inside an Oxfam built solar greenhouse. [Photo credit: Anita Swarup]](images/tajikistan_greenhouse2.jpg "Woman inside an Oxfam built solar greenhouse. [Photo credit: Anita Swarup]")
We concentrate on small plots that are intensive farming – and where people can have control over their land.
Christophe Viltard, Oxfam Livelihoods and Food Security Programme Co-ordinator
Learn more
Read more examples of our work in Tajikistan:
ECHO (Humanitarian Aid Department of the European Commission) is a funding partner of Oxfam in Tajikistan
Living off the land
Tajikistan is the poorest of the 15 former Soviet Republics. The country's economy has deteriorated dramatically since the end of Soviet rule.
Many families rely on growing fruit and vegetables in small ‘kitchen gardens’ for their main source of food and income. However, regular drought and poor harvests make it hard to grow enough food to support themselves.
How Oxfam is helping
We provide seeds and technical advice to help farmers increase the quantity and variety of food they grow. We also encourage rural communities to work together and set up village committees to share advice and provide support to their members.
If people have problems with the gardens they can come and see one of us. If we know what the answer is, we can tell them. If not, we make a note of their problem and pass it on to Oxfam.
Davlatibi Davlatova, Shibanai village committee member
Oxfam's other development work
- Working with female cotton growers to help them get a fair price for what they produce
- Providing clean water and public health training to help reduce the incidence of water-borne diseases such as typhoid
- Helping prepare communities to cope with natural disasters - see Audio slideshow: Dealing with disasters
Being prepared
Tajikistan is often hit by a variety of natural disasters including floods, landslides, avalanches, mudslides and earthquakes. Oxfam's disaster preparedness and prevention work helps communities be better prepared for, and able to cope with natural disasters.
In pictures: Oxfam's disaster preparedness work
On film
Oxfam's Madina Aliberdieva introduces a special flood simulation exercise run as part of our disaster risk reduction work in Tajikistan.
View transcript of disaster preparedness video
Oxfam's 'Strengthening participatory multi-hazard disaster preparedness programme' in Tajikistan is funded by ECHO (Humanitarian Aid Department of the European Commission)
Extreme cold - 2008
The harshest winter for 50 years has caused electricity and clean water shortages in parts of Tajikistan where the temperature dropped as low as minus 25° Celsius.
Oxfam took immediate action to assess how the most vulnerable groups in the southern city of Kulyab had been affected by the energy shortage and exceptionally cold weather. We launched a response to reach 171,200 people.
