A cement plant in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, owned by the Chinese cement company Huaxin. Image from YouTube.
This article was submitted as part of the Global Voices Climate Justice fellowship, which pairs journalists from Sinophone and Global Majority countries to investigate the effects of Chinese development projects abroad. Find more stories here.
Chinese investments have transformed the cement industry in Tajikistan, turning the country from an importer to one of the largest exporters of cement in Central Asia. As of 2024, there were five cement plants built with Chinese capital in the country. The three largest Tajik-Chinese plants are responsible for 85 percent of the annual output. These plants provide jobs for local populations, cover the domestic demand for cement, and bring revenue through exports to neighboring states.
However, these economic benefits do not come without a cost. The environmental impact of cement production is unanimously recognized as negative throughout the world, including in Tajikistan, where a Soviet-era cement plant polluted the air in the capital, Dushanbe, for decades until it was shut down in 2023, with officials citing its environmental damage as the main cause. The use of coal by cement plants in Tajikistan adds another layer of environmental concern since coal is the most polluting energy resource.
Interestingly, Chinese cement plants in Tajikistan have managed to dodge criticism over their polluting effect. Thus, although it may seem these enterprises don’t cause environmental and health damage, the overall environmental record of Chinese investments in the mining, agriculture, and energy sectors speaks otherwise.
The lack of information on cement plants’ polluting effect stems from Tajikistan’s economic reliance on China, its fear of spooking away investors, and the country's overwhelming authoritarian rule, which controls civil society and stifles independent journalism.
The hidden but real environmental cost
It is hard to overestimate the role of China in Tajikistan’s economy. It is simultaneously the country’s biggest investor and lender, as well as the second-largest trade partner. Between 2007 and 2023, Chinese investments totaled USD 3.845 billion, according to Tajikistan’s State Committee for Investments and State Property Management.
Before the Chinese investments, Tajikistan’s cement industry was very limited, with only one Soviet-era cement plant called “Tajik Tsement” operating in Dushanbe. In 2012, the country produced 89,000 tons while its domestic demand stood at 3 million tons. The shortage was filled by imports from Pakistan, Iran, and Kazakhstan.
Cement trucks leaving the Tajik Tsement factory. Image from YouTube.
All of that started changing in 2013 when the private Chinese cement producer Huaxin (华新水泥) and Tajik Gayur Group launched JV Huaxin Gayur Cement (华新亚湾水泥) in the southwestern Khatlon province with an annual capacity of 1.2 million tonnes.
In 2016, the two companies launched another cement plant in the northern Sughd province, JV Huaxin Gayur Sughd Cement, with a similar annual capacity. In the same year, another joint venture called Chzhungtsai Mohir Cement (中材國際莫伊爾水泥) was launched with the same annual capacity of 1.2 million tons in Khatlon province.
These three plants helped Tajikistan turn its fortunes around by ramping up cement production and becoming a major exporter. By 2017, the country increased its annual production to a whopping 3.1 million tons. Thus, Tajikistan managed to not only meet its domestic demand but also export cement to neighboring states.
The economic benefit of these plants has thus far gotten a lot more attention and coverage than the environmental impact.
The most notable critical assessment came out in 2016 in the article titled “China shifts polluting cement to Tajikistan,” in which the author, Dirk Van Der Kley, warned about the polluting effect of Chinese cement investments. This article was cited in the local Tajik independent media outlet Asia Plus in 2017 in its material titled “Harmful cement union of Tajikistan and China,” which quoted an anonymous ecologist who noted the cement plants could cause irreversible damage to the environment.
…Chinese entrepreneurs were forced to look for countries with suitable conditions for expanding their business. For cement producers, such a convenient country turned out to be Tajikistan, where there is a great demand for this building material. In addition, Tajikistan has cheap labor, which also plays into the hands of Chinese investors.
The source regretted that “no one seems to be particularly bothered to think about the disastrous consequences of placing the Chinese cement business in Tajikistan.”
The President of Tajikistan, Emomali Rahmon, signs a bag of cement at a ceremony at a cement plant. The Tajik flag waves in the background. Screenshot from YouTube.
However, the lack of public concern and criticism of these plants does not necessarily mean they don’t cause harm to the local communities living in their vicinity. There is ample evidence to suggest that the environmental and health damage is simply being hidden by the state authorities, who regularly suppress local dissent and censor the media.
This pattern is evident in Tajikistan’s gold mining industry, where China has played a major role. A local branch of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Radio Ozodi, showed that when local communities complain about the environmental and health damage caused by Chinese gold mining and processing plants, Tajik authorities pressure them to keep quiet and not publicly raise such problems.
The investigation interviewed an anonymous source from the Tajik Environmental Protection Committee, who admitted being instructed to turn a blind eye to the pollution caused by the Zarafshon gold mine, which is a joint Tajik-Chinese enterprise and accounts for 70 percent of Tajikistan’s annual gold output.
We also have complaints about environmental pollution, but if we put too much pressure on Zarafshon or increase inspections and fines, the Chinese investor may leave Tajikistan. This would be very harmful for our economy because [the Chinese company] produced some 2.2 billion somoni (USD 201 million) worth of [gold] in six months of 2023…There is currently no other option but to put up with this situation [of the Chinese companies polluting the environment].
Given the importance of Chinese cement plants and Chinese investments overall for Tajikistan’s economy, it is fair to assume that similar silencing and censorship methods are used for the cement plants as well.
Shifting pollution abroad
China is the world’s largest producer of cement. In 2023, China produced 2.1 billion metric tons of cement, more than half of the world’s output. This proves an odd contradiction when China has historically framed its overseas expansion in line with “green development” (绿色发展）and “ecological civilization” (生态文明).
On the one hand, China has elevated these two concepts to national policy, even into the Party Constitution, signifying to what extent the party claims to prioritize ecological development and that it seeks to make China greener. Also, China signed the 2015 Paris Agreement, promising to contribute to global climate justice.
On the other hand, under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), China’s flagship global connectivity project, encompassing trade, infrastructure, and energy, it is pursuing a path of “capacity diplomacy” in Central Asia, with the cement plants in Tajikistan being a stark example of this contradiction. Specifically, China seeks to expand the industrial capacity of other countries as a form of diplomacy. Thus, while China imposes strict pollution limits domestically, it is expanding its high-polluting industries abroad.
As such, Chinese cement companies are increasingly seeking to expand internationally. Huaxin Cement, for example, in its corporate branding, puts its global expansion front and center, touting its presence in Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Tanzania, Zambia, Oman, and Malawi, as can be seen in one of the company's official YouTube advertisements.
Still, Huaxin’s aggressive expansion overseas has not been without international pushback. Huaxin has been criticized by Nepali media for starting to operate its cement plant in Nepal without an Environmental Impact Assessment, beginning in 2019, leading to concerns raised in the Nepali parliament.
China’s pivoting from cement production and Chinese companies’ expansion abroad cautions foreign states against jumping to sign investment deals to build cement plants. Investment-hungry Tajikistan, however, seems willing to look past environmental and public health concerns in exchange for cement self-sufficiency, employment, and profit.
