Our new colleague, Cynthia Buckley, joined a select group of specialists in an Expert Analytical Exchange for Ambassador Susan Elliot (Tajikistan) at the U.S. Department of State on August 1st.  Her presentation, " Labor Migration from Tajikistan: Opportunities, Risks and Obligations," used national surveys, fieldwork in Russia and Tajikistan, and findings from a 2012 study of labor migrants in Nizhny Novgorod, Yekaterinburg and Krasnodar. Cindy offered an overview and assessment of the economic opportunities provided by the substantial flow of remittances into the country (estimated at $2 billion USD in 2011), the domestic socio-political and public health challenges raised by with out-migration dependence, and the importance of labor market access issues in understanding the continued importance of the Russian Federation in Tajikistan's domestic and foreign policy. Her analysis was based on her project on the emergence of the Eurasian migration system, funded by the National Science Foundation.

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