Experts Share Research at 8th "Life in Kyrgyzstan" Conference

The 8th Annual "Life in Kyrgyzstan" (LiK) three-day conference brought together a community of scholars, practitioners, and policy makers to present rigorous evidence-based studies, concluded on 13 October 2022 in Bishkek.

The University of Central Asia’s (UCA) Graduate School of Development (GSD) organized the event jointly with The Leibniz Institute of Vegetable and Ornamental Crops and the International Security and Development Center. Additional partners of the Conference included the American University of Central Asia, Critical Ecosystems Partnership Fund, Mercy Corps, World Bank, and the UN Population Fund.

LiK is a multi-topic longitudinal survey of households and individuals. It has so far tracked data from 3,000 households and 8,000 individuals in all seven oblasts of Kyrgyzstan. The presentations and research shared with the participants brought new insights on a range of social and economic developments in Kyrgyzstan and the Central Asia region.

The breadth and depth of topics covered in this year’s conference incorporated over 20 separate sessions and over 70 papers. Plenary sessions of the conference addressed a range of topics, including social cohesion, household welfare, labour markets, gender and intra-household decision-making, migration and remittances, livelihoods and agricultural market access, export markets and issues of regional integration, and climate change.

While such survey data is commonplace in advanced economies, the LiK data is unique in Central Asia and rare among less advanced economies.  UCA has been and remains deeply supportive of the regular collection of these invaluable data, as well as the annual conferences, which bring to the attention of the international community much about Life in Kyrgyzstan.