President halts state funding for research institutions

Turkmenistan is set to halt state funding for research institutions, dealing another blow to a higher education system crippled by decades of profound isolation, reports Eurasianet.

The decision, outlined in state media reports on 29 and 30 January, is just one of a raft of parallel moves intended to drastically cut spending as the government struggles to cope with a chronic economic slump. TDH state news agency reported that research and training institutions will have to become self-supporting within the coming three years and will “more actively interact with business and investors”. All forms of specialised study are in effect being privatised.

The wide-ranging set of measures to streamline the scientific establishment adopted by President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov included a decree on halting state funding for the Academy of Sciences of Turkmenistan. As TDH reported on 30 January, a conference of scholars at the Oguz Khan University of Engineering Technologies in Ashgabat was corralled to give token blessing to this radical decision, which will also see various branches of the Academy of Sciences cannibalised and spun off to universities.
Full report on the Eurasianet site