17.11.2018 18:02, Dushanbe city

Distinguished Compatriots,
Dear Guests,

The launch of the first hydro unit of ‘Roghun’ Hydropower Plant is a memorable and milestone event for every resident of Tajikistan, which we were looking forward for many years and made hard efforts day and night to achieve this noble objective of us.

My felicitation goes to every inhabitant of our country and our compatriots abroad on the initial power generated in ‘Roghun’ HPP – the bright light of the households of Tajik people and  glittering future of our beloved Motherland.

After we established peace and stability in our precious country, the Government of Tajikistan decided to start this grand project disregard of the uneasy financial and economic situation of our State.

We started the construction of this facility building on the strong will of our people and bearing in mind our national interests in an extremely difficult time, in the period, when the global economy was covered by a severe economic crisis, which also affected our national economy.

Without construction of ‘Roghun’, we would not be able to meet the continuously growing demand of population and various sectors of our economy in electricity and ensure sustainable socio-economic development of our country. Thus, the ‘Roghun’ HPP is the most important driver of future development of Tajikistan and decent life of our people.

This was the reason, the Government of Tajikistan declared the ‘Roghun’ facility as the life-changing asset and grand project of the century and started its construction by involving experienced local and international companies and specialists.

With a view to accelerating the facility construction process, in addition to the public budget the noble people of Tajikistan, organizations and industries, entrepreneurs and businesses as well as our compatriots overseas made a valuable input by purchasing the power plant’s shares.

I would like to take this opportunity to reiterate my gratitude to all of those people and organizations for their patriotic input into this grand facility of the century.

Distinguished Compatriots,

The demand in electricity has been growing regionally and globally during the recent years and according to prediction of specialists this demand will increase by almost four times by 2030 compared to the early 21st century.

The demographic growth, increase in the number of production industries, in one word, development of the national economy and growing demand in power requires to increase its generation in the country.

During 27 years of our independence the power consumption by public increased by 3,5 times and this indicator made 5.7bn kw/h in 2017. Currently the population’s share constitutes more than 42% of the local power consumption.

At the same time, we need to ensure reliable power supply of the industry with a view to achieving our objectives on industrial development and improving the competitiveness of our industrial products.

We prioritized the hydropower sector development in our economic policy and defined energy security as one of our national strategic objectives to particularly ensure our country’s sustainable development and steadily improve the population’s living standards.

We commissioned new assets with the capacity of more than 1300mwt during the 27 years of our independence. In parallel, we proceeded with rehabilitation and renovation of the existing facilities and this process is ongoing dynamically.

Construction of hydropower plants on the rivers of Tajikistan will promote balance between the demand in power and water resources, facilitate sustainable water resources management and address the issue of the lack of electricity in the wider region.

One of the peculiarities of the current time being is the global trend of formulation of ‘green economy’ and thereby focusing on generation of environmentally clean power with the use of renewable energy sources. Tajikistan has abundant hydropower resources that is one of the main sources for generation of ‘green power’. We are eager to use these huge resources not only for our own objectives but also for the benefit of the wider Central and South Asia.

With this idea in mind, we developed several projects over the recent years to increase the energy generation and expansion of electricity transmission networks and in cooperation with our international partners we completed some projects in this area and some other projects are ongoing.

In this regard, we started the implementation of ‘CASA-1000’ regional electricity transmission line project, which will create a favorable opportunity to increase export of power to near and far neighboring countries and meet the growing demand in power in the regional energy market.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Development of energy efficiency culture in population and concurrently the wide use of energy-efficient equipment and technologies is one of the important factors for sustainable development of our economy and ensuring longer life of the energy facilities we constructed. Thus, each of us, distinguished compatriots, need to appreciate our national wealth, creative efforts of the constructors of energy facilities and the energy sector overall.

We may want not to forget that our economy and people suffered from the lack of power in winter period for many years. The lack of electricity during many years negatively affected not only our economy, but all aspects of the social sectors and living standards of population.

I would like to note with a firm belief that the ‘Roghun’ hydropower plant will substantively contribute to energy security of our country and I would like to reiterate my heartfelt congratulations on this milestone occasion of the launch of this facility’s first unit to the entire people of Tajikistan.

May I offer my gratitude to all of the constructors of this life-changing facility and international partner companies for their dedicated efforts in rising this grand construction of the century and wish them further success in their endeavors.

‘Roghun’ is the source of light for every household, warm-heartedness of every citizen of our country, source of pride of the Tajik people, pledge of sustainable development of Tajikistan and reputation of the sovereign state of Tajiks!

Congratulations on the launch of the first unit of ‘Roghun’ — the pride of every Tajik citizen and the symbol of dignity and honor of the current and future generations of our Motherland!

I wish you continued health and prosperity!