Turkmenistan’s New International Outlook in the Context of Regional and Global Challenges

Political and socio-economic developments in the Central Asian region are occupying an increasing role and exerting a growing influence on the shape of the world order. The speech which was delivered by the President of Turkmenistan Serdar Berdimuhamedov to the State Council on September 23, 2022 has been an important indication of this trend. The President of Turkmenistan spoke not only about the processes endemic to his nation but provided an overall assessment of global and regional challenges and opportunities as well as Turkmenistan’s contribution to meeting them in the most constructive manner. This certainly could not have been overlooked by Turkmenistan’s partners and interlocutors in other comers of the world.

The international community is currently undergoing powerful strains — in the realms of international law, international trade, international finance, interstate migration as well as in technological, epidemiological, and environmental spheres. Cooperation and a balanced attitude to interstate relations are in scant supply - globally and regionally. It is in this sense especially that Turkmenistan’s record of pursuing competent, thoughtful, and even-handed foreign policy stands out most conspicuously. This record was fully reflected in President Serdar Berdimuhamedov’s speech to the State Council in 2022. The crux of his message to the world community was to underscore the importance of addressing national concerns through an international posture of multilateral cooperation and careful weighing of the interests of all parties involved. In the United States, Turkmenistan’s policy of consistent neutrality and readiness to sustain regional and international cooperation between states has been met with deep appreciation and growing interest. Lincoln University in Oakland, California (LU) has been among the most welcoming observers.

LU has been paying a lot of attention to the developments in Central Asia and to Turkmenistan’s contribution to regional prosperity and stability. LU has consistently opened its doors to the students from this region of the world. LU has also bestowed an honorary doctoral degree to the Second President of Turkmenistan Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov - an additional factor which strengthens LU’s interest in Turkmenistan’s development and in sustaining the ties of cooperation. Below follows a review of the main themes in the report of the President of Turkmenistan and LU’s vision of prospective ties between the US and Turkmenistan.

The President of Turkmenistan Serdar Berdimuhamedov in his speech to the State Council emphasized that progressive evolution of the national community must be based on a careful combination of international and regional opportunities, on the one hand, and domestic factors, on the other. Ideally, one should not come at the expense of the other. Turkmenistan has indeed excelled at attaining and maintaining over time this pragmatic political outlook. Linking the domestic resources and comparative advantages which Turkmenistan possesses with international demand has been one of the achievements of the Turkmen government since its independence 31 years ago. In addition, as President Serdar Berdimuhamedov noted, Turkmenistan has been equally adept at pursuing a simultaneous policy of external and internal diversification of its national economy. Moreover; the intensification of this policy of domestic economic and foreign trade diversification has been identified by the President of Turkmenistan as a national goal of utmost significance. This commitment could not possibly be understated given the frictions that the international economic turbulence is now placing on the developing nations of the world, Turkmenistan among them. A careful pursuit of linkages to foreign markets combined with a policy stressing the development of internal manufacturing and science- and technology-intensive sectors is understood as a major priority by the Turkmen government.

Turkmenistan is pursuing the course of expanding its access to international capital markets and attracting foreign direct investment, which it sees as a crucial precondition for national development. Importantly, the government of Turkmenistan is committed to reaching out to various sources of foreign capital and diversifying them. The presidential address to the State Council indicates that Turkmenistan is deeply interested in preserving and maintaining a stable system of cross-national capital mobility, which recently has become plagued by massive disruptions and protectionist impediments. A similar effort is being made in the export sector. It centers around the expansion of foreign trade infrastructure, including transportation, which of course requires sizeable financial and technological commitment of resources. These goals cannot be reliably achieved and sustained without regional stability and confidence in the future. Turkmenistan is committed to maintaining regional peace and mutual respect for states’ national interests. It is clear, based on Turkmenistan’s record since the very early days of its independence, that the leadership of Turkmenistan has done its utmost to preserve peace and mutually cooperative environment in the region and beyond.

As was mentioned before, for all the importance that Turkmenistan places on developing and expanding its ties and links with the surrounding region and the world market at large, Ashgabat stresses another priority in its strategy of national progress - domestic economic diversification and solidification of the manufacturing base. President Serdar Berdimuhamedov noted in his speech that the government of Turkmenistan is pursuing a policy of encouraging investment not just in natural resource extraction but in constructing a manufacturing capacity to produce sophisticated high value-added products with an increasing competitive potential regionally and worldwide.

Turkmenistan’s stance in its international outlook is distinctive especially in the value it places on caution and balance when it comes to tackling multiple regional challenges - from political instability and international price shocks to demography and the issues related to climate change and the environment. Turkmenistan has consistently stood for a careful mix of working within both bilateral as well as multilateral formats of addressing and solving conflicts and minimizing a zero-sum approach to dealing with clashes of interest. President Serdar Berdimuhamedov remains committed to always searching for common ground and avoiding exacerbating differences in our increasingly competitive world environment. Turkmenistan has earned a reputation for being a reliable and responsible member of the international community of nations and a very important rampart of stability in the Central Asian region. This cannot be underestimated.

It is true that, when it comes to the American audience responding the developments in Central Asia in general and in Turkmenistan in particular, the first set of issues concerns the realm of international relations and foreign policy. But the President of Turkmenistan has in fact devoted much of his speech to the issues of domestic socio-economic and technological development of his nation. LU is an educational institution first and foremost - and it is only natural that we would like to draw our readers’ attention to problems related to the sphere of humanitarian concerns.

The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 has led to a massive implosion of the old educational system in all the successor states, including Turkmenistan. This implosion, however, was not entirely unique to the ex-socialist states - excessive commercialization within the educational system as a whole has led to the slump in the socio-cultural status of an educator or a pedagogue or a teacher. Of course, there is a great variation in the standing and material compensation of an educator depending on the tier of the educational institution he/she is operating in. Nevertheless, the decline in the social standing of teachers has been noticeable and alarming.

The President of Turkmenistan indicated in his speech to the State Council that the national government realizes the importance of the quality and accessibility of education and considers its development a national priority. Education is not something that can be simply relegated to the forces of free market - it must be insured and cultivated with the crucial assistance from national authorities. Elevating the social status of educators, providing higher pay to school teachers and college instructors are considered by the government of Turkmenistan as a goal vital to improving the society and its competitive edge in the region and internationally. We are excited to see this serious pledge.

Education and economic development are intricately interconnected and mutually beneficial if properly coordinated and organized. The government of Turkmenistan appreciates this interconnection. With the expansion and the deepening of the domestic manufacturing base and with a program of job-creation recognized by Turkmenistan’s leadership as a central national priority, improvements in the sphere of technical and vocational education become particularly important. A growing demand for specialists in increasingly technologically sophisticated production requires fostering of the extensive network of vocational schools with highly trained and competent personnel.

Training such personnel and providing vocational and technical schools with access to an international reservoir of knowledge is a key component of national competitiveness in the world economy. The experience of Germany and Switzerland seems to be of particular use for Turkmenistan, especially when it comes to preparing specialists for middle-sized and small businesses. When it comes to the institutions of higher learning and universities, the experience of the US and China in connecting scientific research agencies with prospective employers serves as a primary example for Turkmenistan. The government of Turkmenistan recognizes the significance of the need to drastically improve the educational system of the country with a specific emphasis placed on technical-vocational schools, on the one hand, and university-level scientific research, on the other.

Research in the medical sphere and improvements in the sphere of public health are especially important, according to the strategic vision of the President of Turkmenistan. This of course is due to multiple factors - some internal and others global. The Covid-19 pandemic of 2020-2022 showed the importance of international cooperation and ability to react to challenges of that magnitude flexibly and in a coordinated manner. More than that, the former President of Turkmenistan, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov had a medical scientific background and was always personally involved in the issues of national healthcare, including tackling the implications of the drying-up of the Aral Sea and the salt- induced land and water degradation. Monitoring health conditions of the population of Turkmenistan and providing for increasing availability of necessary pharmaceuticals are two of the most important responsibilities of the national government. Turkmenistan can already boast of significant practical gains in this direction, especially in terms of its relationships with German public authorities and German R&D community as well as the private (corporate) sector, i.e. Siemens. Nonetheless, developing ties of cooperation in the sphere of medical science with the American private sector and NGOs retains much room for improvement and growth for Turkmenistan. In the sphere of public health administration, the experience of Germany, Japan and Turkey is indispensable.

Turkmenistan is located in the zone of extreme seismic danger. In 1948 the earthquake in Ashgabat devasted the entire capital of the Turkmen Republic. This factor plays a very important role not only in terms of architectural requirements for residential and industrial structures but also for the organization of the urban space. Designing buildings which are quake-proven and seismologically resilient requires top-notch technological skills and bulky financial resources. Turkmenistan can benefit enormously from establishing and cultivating ties of cooperation with the scientific and engineering communities of the advanced industrialized world with an exemplary record of working in earthquake-prone areas - San Francisco, Los Angeles and Tokyo, for instance.

Turkmenistan’s natural landscapes are legendary. It’s famous not just for its spectacular deserts but also for its green and lush oases. The government of Turkmenistan has always paid attention not just to the upkeep of its national preserves and parks but also to developing a more worldwide awareness of the beauty of its national natural treasures. This beauty, however, requires constant care and increasing attention given the broader climatic changes affecting the world. The American experience, positive as well as somewhat problematic in the light of the recent chain of massive wildfires, of managing national forests, parks, preserves, wild-life and bodies of water can be of remarkable value to the nation of Turkmenistan. Here the experiences of both the federal government as well as state-level and municipal authorities are relevant.

The challenges facing Turkmenistan domestically and regionally are significant but the determination of its leadership to prepare for them adequately and in a surefooted manner is equally impressive. Turkmenistan is an important contributor to the stability and prosperity of the region.

LU in Oakland, California has had an impressive record of working with the students from Turkmenistan. We remain open to this cooperation and eager to welcome more. LU has an outstanding program in Business Administration and is prepared to do its utmost to assist the nation of Turkmenistan in making gains at least in some of the areas which President Serdar Berdimuhamedov outlined in his strategic vision published in September 2022.

Dr. Allan Samson, Chairman Emeritus of the Board of Trustees, Lincoln University.

Dr. Leon Kil, professor of UC Berkeley and Lincoln University.

https://turkmenistan.gov.tm/en/post/67194/turkmenistans-new-international-outlook-context-regional-and-global-challenges