Today, in the afternoon, in New York, the President of the Republic of Tajikistan Emomali Rahmon attended and spoke at the high-level event "From the Millennium Development Goals to the Sustainable Development Goals in the Asia-Pacific region".

Tajik President Emomali Rahmon said in his speech that "We are now at a very important stage in history when our decisions are dependent on the fate of our future generations. The landlocked countries of our region, in particular the least developed and developing countries and small island countries have common challenges and priorities, the decision and the implementation of which require our immediate and decisive action at both national and regional levels".

According to Emomali Rahmon, "Tajikistan is a pilot country in the implementation of the Millennium Development Goals and in collaboration with the United Nations Development Programme has developed a National Development Strategy for the period until 2015, which played an important role in systematizing the process of development of the country for the long term in line with the Millennium Development Goals. It defined the priorities and general directions of the state policy to achieve sustainable economic growth, ensuring people's access to basic social services and poverty reduction". The President stated that "As a result of measures to promote economic growth in recent years, we managed to significantly reduce the level of poverty in the country".

Taking into account the experience gained during the implementation of poverty reduction strategy, was approved and implemented a strategy to promote the welfare of the population of Tajikistan for the period 2013-2015. In accordance with this strategy, measures were taken to improve governance and sustained economic growth based on private sector development and to encourage investment, improve the quality of education, access to quality health care, drinking water and sanitation, and gender equality.

Emomali Rahmon stressed the contribution of the Republic of Tajikistan in the process of development and coordination of the global development agenda beyond 2015, and recalled that "the Government of the Republic of Tajikistan held a series of national consultations to reflect the aspirations and perspectives of the general population. We are currently in close cooperation with the United Nations Development Programme developing medium-term program of national development for the period 2016-2020 and the new National Strategy for development of the country until 2030, during the formulation of which, along with the priorities of sustainable and long-term development of the country will be taken into account as much as possible the tasks specified in the framework of sustainable development goals".

The President of Tajikistan Emomali Rahmon gave particular importance to regional cooperation in areas, such as infrastructure development, the implementation of projects for the construction of railways and roads, power lines and gas pipelines, and said that "the withdrawal of our country from communication deadlock is reflected as a strategic task in all policy documents on national development".

According to Emomali Rahmon, "The Republic of Tajikistan is actively engaged in the construction and expansion of the network of internal roads linking us with regional and international transport and communication nodes. A number of projects of railways, power lines and gas pipelines are under consideration and being designed, giving us the opportunity to enter an appropriate infrastructure of China, Afghanistan, Iran, Turkmenistan and other countries of the region".

According to the President of Tajikistan Emomali Rahmon, "in order to fulfill its tasks we require the mobilization of the necessary resources that is problematic in conditions of increased volatility in international relations and the emergence of new crises in various regions of the world". Therefore, Head of Tajikistan noted the importance of "an increase in official development assistance as an important component of financing for development" and stressed that "These circumstances require the recovery of the world trade and investment, the main engines of growth of production, encouraging and promoting the full transfer of new and environmentally sustainable technologies".

At the end of his speech, President Emomali Rahmon once again stressed that Tajikistan will continue to actively cooperate with all countries in the region and with the UN agencies and programs in the successful implementation of sustainable development goals.