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Location: Central Asia, west of China
Geographic coordinates: 39 00 N, 71 00 E
Map references: Commonwealth of Independent States
Area:
total: 143,100 sq km
land: 142,700 sq km
water: 400 sq km
Area - comparative: slightly smaller than Wisconsin
Land boundaries:
total: 3,651 km
border countries: Afghanistan 1,206 km, China 414 km, Kyrgyzstan
870 km, Uzbekistan 1,161 km
Coastline: 0 km (landlocked)
Maritime claims: none (landlocked)
Climate: midlatitude continental, hot summers, mild winters;
semiarid to polar in Pamir Mountains
Terrain: Pamir and Alay mountains dominate landscape; western
Fergana Valley in north, Kofarnihon and Vakhsh Valleys in southwest
Elevation extremes:
lowest point: Syrdariya 300 m
highest point: Pik Imeni Ismail Samani 7,495 m
Natural resources: hydropower, some petroleum, uranium,
mercury, brown coal, lead, zinc, antimony, tungsten
Land use:
arable land: 6%
permanent crops: 0%
permanent pastures: 25%
forests and woodland: 4%
other: 65% (1993 est.)
Irrigated land: 6,390 sq km (1993 est.)
Natural hazards: NA
Environment - current issues: inadequate sanitation facilities;
increasing levels of soil salinity; industrial pollution; excessive
pesticides; part of the basin of the shrinking Aral Sea suffers
from severe overutilization of available water for irrigation and
associated pollution
Environment - international agreements:
party to: Biodiversity, Climate Change, Desertification,
Environmental Modification, Ozone Layer Protection
signed, but not ratified: none of the selected agreements
Geography - note: landlocked
Tajikistan
Country
Formal Name: Republic of Tajikistan.
Short Form: Tajikistan.
Term for Citizens: Tajikistani(s).
Capital: Dushanbe.
Date of Independence: September 9, 1991.
Geography
Size: Approximately 143,100 square kilometers.
Topography: Mainly mountainous, with lower elevations
in northwest, southwest, and Fergana Valley in far northern zone.
Highest elevations in southeast, in Pamir-Alay system; numerous
glaciers in mountains. Dense river network creates valleys through
mountain chains. Lakes primarily in Pamir region to the east.
Climate: Mainly continental, with drastic changes
according to elevation. Arid in subtropical southwest lowlands,
which have highest temperatures; lowest temperatures at highest
altitudes. Highest precipitation near Fedchenko Glacier, lowest
in eastern Pamirs.
Data as of March 1996
Tajikistan
Physical Environment
Mountains cover 93 percent of Tajikistan's surface area. The two
principal ranges, the Pamir and the Alay, give rise to many glacier-fed
streams and rivers, which have been used to irrigate farmlands since
ancient times. Central Asia's other major mountain range, the Tian
Shan, skirts northern Tajikistan. Mountainous terrain separates
Tajikistan's two population centers, which are in the lowlands of
the southern and northern sections of the country. Especially in
areas of intensive agricultural and industrial activity, the Soviet
Union's natural resource utilization policies left independent Tajikistan
with a legacy of environmental problems.
Data as of March 1996
Tajikistan
Dimensions and Borders
With an area of 143,100 square kilometers, Tajikistan is about
the same size as the state of Wisconsin. Its maximum east-to-west
extent is 700 kilometers, and its maximum north-to-south extent
is 350 kilometers. The country's highly irregular border is about
3,000 kilometers long, including 430 kilometers along the Chinese
border to the east and 1,030 kilometers along the frontier with
Afghanistan to the south. Most of the southern border with Afghanistan
is set by the Amu Darya (darya is the Persian word for
river) and its tributary the Panj River (Darya-ye Panj), which has
headwaters in Afghanistan and Tajikistan. The other neighbors are
the former Soviet republics of Uzbekistan (to the west and the north)
and Kyrgyzstan (to the north).
Data as of March 1996
Tajikistan
Topography and Drainage
The lower elevations of Tajikistan are divided into northern and
southern regions by a complex of three mountain chains that constitute
the westernmost extension of the massive Tian Shan system. Running
essentially parallel from east to west, the chains are the Turkestan,
Zarafshon, and Hisor (Gisar) mountains . The last of these lies
just north of the capital, Dushanbe, which is situated in west-central
Tajikistan.
More than half of Tajikistan lies above an elevation of 3,000
meters. Even the lowlands, which are located in the Fergana Valley
in the far north and in the southwest, are well above sea level.
In the Turkestan range, highest of the western chains, the maximum
elevation is 5,510 meters. The highest elevations of this range
are in the southeast, near the border with Kyrgyzstan. That region
is dominated by the peaks of the Pamir-Alay mountain system, including
two of the three highest elevations in the former Soviet Union:
Mount Lenin (7,134 meters) and Mount Communism (7,495 meters). Several
other peaks in the region also exceed 7,000 meters. The mountains
contain numerous glaciers, the largest of which, the Fedchenko,
covers more than 700 square kilometers and is the largest glacier
in the world outside the polar regions. Because Tajikistan lies
in an active seismic belt, severe earthquakes are common.
The Fergana Valley, the most densely populated region in Central
Asia, spreads across northern Tajikistan from Uzbekistan on the
west to Kyrgyzstan on the east (see fig. 1). This long valley, which
lies between two mountain ranges, reaches its lowest elevation of
320 meters at Khujand on the Syrdariya. Rivers bring rich soil deposits
into the Fergana Valley from the surrounding mountains, creating
a series of fertile oases that have long been prized for agriculture
.
In Tajikistan's dense river network, the largest rivers are the
Syrdariya and the Amu Darya; the largest tributaries are the Vakhsh
and the Kofarnihon, which form valleys from northeast to southwest
across western Tajikistan. The Amu Darya carries more water than
any other river in Central Asia. The upper course of the Amu Darya,
called the Panj River, is 921 kilometers long. The river's name
changes at the confluence of the Panj, the Vakhsh, and the Kofarnihon
rivers in far southwestern Tajikistan. The Vakhsh, called the Kyzyl-Suu
upstream in Kyrgyzstan and the Surkhob in its middle course in north-central
Tajikistan, is the second largest river in southern Tajikistan after
the Amu-Panj system. In the Soviet era, the Vakhsh was dammed at
several points for irrigation and electric power generation, most
notably at Norak (Nurek), east of Dushanbe, where one of the world's
highest dams forms the Norak Reservoir. Numerous factories also
were built along the Vakhsh to draw upon its waters and potential
for electric power generation.
The two most important rivers in northern Tajikistan are the Syrdariya
and the Zarafshon. The former, the second longest river in Central
Asia, stretches 195 kilometers (of its total length of 2,400 kilometers)
across the Fergana Valley in far-northern Tajikistan. The Zarafshon
River runs 316 kilometers (of a total length of 781 kilometers)
through the center of Tajikistan. Tajikistan's rivers reach high-water
levels twice a year: in the spring, fed by the rainy season and
melting mountain snow, and in the summer, fed by melting glaciers.
The summer freshets are the more useful for irrigation, especially
in the Fergana Valley and the valleys of southeastern Tajikistan.
Most of Tajikistan's lakes are of glacial origin and are located
in the Pamir region. The largest, the Qarokul (Kara-Kul), is a salt
lake devoid of life, lying at an elevation of 4,200 meters.
Data as of March 1996
Tajikistan
Climate
In general, Tajikistan's climate is continental, subtropical,
and semiarid, with some desert areas. The climate changes drastically
according to elevation, however. The Fergana Valley and other lowlands
are shielded by mountains from Arctic air masses, but temperatures
in that region still drop below freezing for more than 100 days
a year. In the subtropical southwestern lowlands, which have the
highest average temperatures, the climate is arid, although some
sections now are irrigated for farming. At Tajikistan's lower elevations,
the average temperature range is 23° to 30° C in July and
-1° to 3°C in January. In the eastern Pamirs, the average
July temperature is 5° to 10°C, and the average January
temperature is -15° to -20°C. The average annual precipitation
for most of the republic ranges between 700 and 1,600 millimeters.
The heaviest precipitation falls are at the Fedchenko Glacier, which
averages 2,236 millimeters per year, and the lightest in the eastern
Pamirs, which average less than 100 millimeters per year. Most precipitation
occurs in the winter and spring.
Data as of March 1996
Tajikistan
Environmental Problems
Most of Tajikistan's environmental problems are related to the
agricultural policies imposed on the country during the Soviet period.
By 1991 heavy use of mineral fertilizers and agricultural chemicals
was a major cause of pollution in the republic. Among those chemicals
were DDT, banned by international convention, and several defoliants
and herbicides. In addition to the damage they have done to the
air, land, and water, the chemicals have contaminated the cottonseeds
whose oil is used widely for cooking. Cotton farmers and their families
are at particular risk from the overuse of agricultural chemicals,
both from direct physical contact in the field and from the use
of the branches of cotton plants at home for fuel. All of these
toxic sources are believed to contribute to a high incidence of
maternal and child mortality and birth defects. In 1994 the infant
mortality rate was 43.2 per 1,000 births, the second highest rate
among former Soviet republics. The rate in 1990 had been 40.0 infant
deaths per 1,000 births .
Cotton requires particularly intense irrigation (see Agriculture,
this ch.). In Tajikistan's cotton-growing regions, farms were established
in large, semiarid tracts and in tracts reclaimed from the desert,
but cotton's growing season is summer, when the region receives
virtually no rainfall. The 50 percent increase in cotton cultivation
mandated by Soviet and post-Soviet agricultural planners between
1964 and 1994 consequently overtaxed the regional water supply.
Poorly designed irrigation networks led to massive runoff, which
increased soil salinity and carried toxic agricultural chemicals
downstream to other fields, the Aral Sea, and populated areas of
the region.
By the 1980s, nearly 90 percent of water use in Central Asia was
for agriculture. Of that quantity, nearly 75 percent came from the
Amu Darya and the Syrdariya, the chief tributaries of the Aral Sea
on the Kazakstan-Uzbekistan border to the northwest of Tajikistan.
As the desiccation of the Aral Sea came to international attention
in the 1980s, water-use policy became a contentious issue between
Soviet republics such as Tajikistan, where the main rivers rise,
and those farther downstream, including Uzbekistan. By the end of
the Soviet era, the central government had relinquished central
control of water-use policy for Central Asia, but the republics
had not agreed on an allocation policy.
Industry also causes pollution problems. A major offender is the
production of nonferrous metals. One of Tajikistan's leading industrial
sites, the aluminum plant at Regar (also known as Tursunzoda), west
of Dushanbe near the border with Uzbekistan, generates large amounts
of toxic waste gases that have been blamed for a sharp increase
in the number of birth defects among people who live within range
of its emissions.
In 1992 the Supreme Soviet of Tajikistan established a Ministry
of Environmental Protection. However, the enforcement activity of
the ministry was limited severely by the political upheavals that
plagued Tajikistan in its first years of independence . The only
registered private environmental group in Tajikistan in the early
1990s was a chapter of the Social-Ecological Alliance, the largest
informal environmental association in the former Soviet Union. The
Tajikistani branch's main functions have been to conduct environmental
research and to organize protests against the Roghun Hydroelectric
Plant project .
Data as of March 1996
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