Caspian Business Journal

Kyrgyzstan’s New Construction Regulations

At the end of November, authorities in Kyrgyzstan announced a number of changes to building codes, designed to save on energy usage and reduce green house emissions by up to 30% by 2020, in line with EU  policies [1].  The government program is receiving $15 million in funding from the US Global Environment Fund, an organization that supports similar projects in Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. In Kyrgyzstan, the program is designed to reduce energy consumption by almost 45% over the next three years.

Another goal of the program is obviously environmental, with a reduction in green house gases tied together with energy usage reduction.  The 45% reduction in consumption that the Kyrgyz government would like to see over the next three years is equal, according to a UNDP report, to running one of their coal-fired power plants for 6 months.  Warming temperatures in the mountains combined with poor water planning could also affect the Kyrgyz agricultural sector. According to the UNDP’s Zukhra Abaikhanova [2] because almost 90% of water used in Kyrgyzstan is used for irrigation, “Agricultural zoning to ensure food security and more efficient use of water at household and state level needs to be implemented.”

Kyrgyzstan’s difficulties dealing with residential power and heating over the past few winters, combined with continued spats over water and electricity usage and transmission over Soviet-era lines and policies, seem to have prompted the government in Bishkek to take more decisive action.  Reducing energy usage and increasing efficiency in residential areas could offset the effects of regional rumblings and in the end possibly strengthen the local construction market.

An interesting and potentially profitable development would be for Bishkek, and the rest of Kyrgyzstan, to become a center for green-construction building sites. This could lead to strategic business partnerships with those US and European firms that possess innovative technologies and building material advances.

Some of the additional outlined goals of the US Global Environment Fund program include:

• Developing and strengthening enforcement of building energy performance codes and energy passports
• Building capacity of relevant government authorities, architects, and energy managers
• Showcasing integrated building design approaches through a number of demonstration projects in schools, hospitals and multi-apartment residential buildings across the region.

The CBJ will continue to follow these developments and in the coming weeks with a closer look at business opportunities and the market landscape for new construction in Kyrgyzstan in 2010.

Footnotes:

[1]  UNDP,  http://europeandcis.undp.org/environment/iep/show/11A5395D-F203-1EE9-BC154BF7C9ED5DBC

[2] Ibid.