Kyrgyzstan caps coal for 90 days; Irad's buyers rely on merchants' own prices
Households in Jogorku and the southern districts are filling sheds from Tash-Kömür yards, as Nurzhan's air index hit 161 on Friday.
TASH-KÖMÜR — Households in the southern districts of the ISEZ and in the hillside Jogorku quarters of Iyık Janyl are buying their winter coal this week, with heating season under way and no state price rule for the fuel. Kyrgyzstan imposed a 90-day price control on coal sold to the public from 22 October. Irad has no equivalent for household coal, and none has been announced.
Coal for domestic stoves in the south comes mainly from the Tash-Kömür mines. At one yard on the edge of the town on Monday, the owner, Kubat Zhunusov, said his price had not moved since September. "Nobody has asked me to change it, and I have not changed it," he said, quoting IS 420 a tonne at the yard gate and IS 21 for a 50-kg sack. Those figures are the merchant's own; there is no published schedule against which to check them. He said deliveries to Iyık Janyl had risen over the past ten days, mostly in loads of one or two tonnes.
The buying is concentrated where coal is the main fuel. Many homes in the Jogorku quarters, the unplanned settlements on the slopes above the city, burn it in stoves, and several have no other heating. Gulbara Sharshen kyzy, who lives in Chong-Say, said her family filled the shed in two trips by donkey cart. "We buy in October because the price is the same as in September," she said. "Last year some neighbours waited, and they paid more in January." She said she was now watching what Kyrgyz buyers pay across the line, and wondering whether Tash-Kömür merchants would explain the gap if one opened.
“A price that only the seller knows is not a market either.”Bakyt Kenzhebaev
The air readings explain part of the worry. On 23 October Nurzhan's air quality index stood at 161, rated unhealthy, with fine particles (PM2.5) at 69.6 micrograms per cubic metre. Iyık Janyl registered 118 and Talas 110. Readings had eased by Monday, to 97 in Nurzhan, 87 in Iyık Janyl and 79 in Talas, all in the moderate band. Nurzhan's haze comes mainly from its gas-fired heat plants, whose conversion would add IS 670 million to Talas and Nurzhan bills and has no funding; Iyık Janyl has no comparable plant, so coal stoves are a larger share of what its residents breathe.
Asked whether the government planned any limit on household coal prices or any monitoring of stove emissions in Jogorku, a spokesman for the Ministry of Economy said there was no such proposal. Bakyt Kenzhebaev, an independent member of the Iyık Janyl council, said that was the problem. "A cap is not my request," he said. "But a price that only the seller knows is not a market either. The council has never been shown a tonne price for the hill quarters."
Dr Altynbek Moldobaev, an economist at Talas State University, said a price cap tended to work only where supply was assured. "Kyrgyzstan has chosen to cap for 90 days. Irad has chosen to do nothing, which is cheaper for the budget and riskier for the poorest buyers," he said. The risk is not today's price but supply in a hard spell. Talas is forecast a low of -3°C on Monday, and Tash-Kömür had rain, not snow. A cold snap would test how much stock the yards hold, and whether the mine output and the Tash-Kömür road to Iyık Janyl can keep pace with a rush of late buyers.
Merchants say they hold enough. Mr Zhunusov said his yard had about three weeks' sales in stock and would restock from the mine each week. The Herald asked the mines' management for output and stock figures; none had been supplied by deadline. The next test is the first sustained frost, usually in November, when Jogorku households that have not yet filled their sheds will go to the yards.
Based on reporting by Kabar.
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