Crossroads Asia | Economy | Central Asia

Tajikistan’s Households Spend More Than They Earn

The gap is narrow, but it leaves families with little room to absorb new shocks, including those now emerging from the war in Iran.

In 2024, Tajik households spent slightly more per person each month than they earned, according to a household budget survey published earlier this year by Tajikistan’s Agency on Statistics. Based on data from 3,000 households, the report showed that average monthly income per household member was 1,082 somoni (approximately $99 at 2024 exchange rates), while average monthly expenditures stood at 1,110 somoni ($102). The gap is narrow in absolute terms but devastating in implication: Tajik households have little financial cushion. The war in Iran could widen that gap further by adding pressure to prices, trade routes, and household budgets.

The government data confirms Tajikistan’s standing as Central Asia’s poorest country. Over half of all household spending in 2024 went to food – 51.3 percent nationally, and 54.5 percent in urban areas. Bread products alone consumed nearly a third of the food budget, followed by meat at 24 percent and cooking oil at 8.2 percent. Non-food items took 35.6 percent, while spending on services – healthcare, education, transport – fell to just 12.2 percent of the budget, down from 22 percent in 2021. The decline suggests households are cutting back on healthcare, education, and transport to keep food on the table.

Incomes have grown in nominal terms over the survey period, from 374 somoni per person per month in 2017 to 1,082 in 2024, but an analysis by Asia-Plus argues that much of this growth has been consumed by inflation and the somoni’s slide against the U.S. dollar, which fell from 5.3 to roughly 10.9 somoni per dollar over the past decade. Wages as a share of household income have declined from 47.5 percent in 2017 to 41.8 percent in 2024, while “other receipts” – primarily remittances from labor migrants in Russia – accounted for 35.7 percent. The World Bank estimated that remittances reached the equivalent of 45 percent of Tajikistan’s GDP in 2024, the highest ratio in the world. Almost one in seven household members was living and working abroad at any given point during the survey period.

The urban-rural divide is stark. Urban........

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