The Economy. Tajikistan's economy depends on agriculture, which employs two-fifths of the labour force. The civil war that followed Tajikistan's independence devastated agriculture and industry in the republic.
Resources Tajikistan possesses rich mineral deposits. Important metallic ores are iron, lead, zinc, antimony, mercury, gold, tin, and tungsten. Nonmetallic minerals include common salt, carbonates, fluorite, arsenic, quartz sand, asbestos, and precious and semiprecious stones. Energy resources include sizable coal deposits and smaller reserves of natural gas and petroleum. Some of the fast-flowing mountain streams have been exploited as hydroelectric power sources.
Agriculture.
Farming still leads industry in importance in the economy of Tajikistan, and cotton growing surpasses all other categories of the country's agriculture. Other important branches include the raising of livestock--including long-horned cattle, Gissar sheep, and goats--and the cultivation of fruits, grains, and vegetables. Tajikistan's farmers grow wheat and barley and have expanded rice cultivation. Horticulture has been important in the territory of Tajikistan since antiquity, and apricots, pears, apples, plums, quinces, cherries, pomegranates, figs, and nuts are produced. The country exports almonds, dried apricots, and grapes.
Agriculture in Tajikistan would be severely limited without extensive irrigation. By the end of the 1930s the Soviet government had built two main canals, the Vakhsh and the Gissar, and followed these with two joint Tajik-Uzbek projects, the Great Fergana and North Fergana canals, using conscripted unskilled labour in a program that drew wide criticism from outside observers for its high toll of fatalities. After World War II the Dalverzin and Parkhar-Chubek irrigation systems were built, along with the Muminobod, Kattasoy, and Selbur reservoirs; the Mirzachol irrigation system; and a water tunnel from the Vakhsh River to the Yovonsu Valley. (see irrigation.)
Pesticides and chemical fertilizers used on the cotton fields have damaged the environment and led to health problems in the population. The upriver irrigation systems carry these pollutants into the rivers descending from Tajikistan's mountains and into neighbouring republics. ( See Water pollution.)
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