The European Education Initiative was launched as part of the EU-Central Asia Strategy in 2007. By 2009, the initiative had prioritised higher and vocational education and emphasised links with the Bologna Process. Attempts were made to establish the EU-Central Asia Education Platform - a re-branding of Tempus and Erasmus Mundus programmes within a set of specific activities - and outline the ways in which internal EU education policy development processes could be externalised to the Central Asia region. However, the slow and uncertain pace of development of the Education Initiative, with the exception of the CAREN programme, calls for analysis of the logic, content and practice of what has been attempted. It is also necessary to examine the political and institutional context that explains the lack of traction gained with education policy actors in the EU and Central Asia, and the prospects for a more compelling vision and concrete programme of implementation that could meet the real and urgent needs of Central Asian countries. Drawing on the evidence provided by participants in the development of the Education Initiative, this paper concludes by outlining an agenda for addressing its weaknesses.

European Union (EU) assistance in general and to Central Asia in particular is a complicated, many sided and fairly opaque business. Over a seven-year period, 719 million Euros were to be set aside for assistance to the region through the new EU Development Cooperation Instrument (DCI). This EUCAM working paper aims to shed light on EU assistance. It addresses the 'what', 'where' and 'how' of EU assistance to Central Asian republics. The 'why' question is beyond the scope of this paper, but stands central in many other EUCAM publications. The paper concludes with recommendations that apply to EU assistance over the medium and long terms.

There is at present an overlapping but inadequately coordinated combination of strategic trans-continental transport corridors or axes stretching across the Eurasian landmass, centred on or around Central Asia. There are three such initiatives - from the EU, China and the Asian Development Bank, and the Eurasian Economic Community. This paper reviews these several strategic transport maps, and makes proposals for their coordination and rationalisation. So far the EU Central Asia strategy has not paid much attention to these questions. However the EU’s own initiatives (the Pan-European Axes and the TRACECA programme) are in need of updating and revision to take into account major investments being made by other parties.

Agriculture constitutes one of the main sectors in the economies of Central Asia: cotton production in Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, a booming grain sector in Kazakhstan; and a long tradition of vegetable cultivation throughout the region. The agrarian question is sensitive since the population is predominantly rural and because food safety is not ensured in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Whereas Central Asia is a modest partner in terms of agricultural trade and relatively few European companies are based in the sector, the agrarian issue is of importance for the EU. In the face of massive corruption, what cooperative development should be proposed in agriculture by Brussels? What policy should be pursued towards cotton production in which often child labour is involved? How should land reform be supported? These are questions that stand central in this EUCAM working paper.

There is a profound connection between economics and politics. A stronger economy creates a basis for more ambitious political actions and programmes. At the opposite end, an economic downturn and recession breed social tensions and can undermine the political order. Both the EU and Central Asian states have been seriously affected by the global economic crisis, in different ways. This EUCAM working paper focuses on the impact of the crisis on Central Asian politics and geopolitics and the implications of these developments for the EU engagement in the region.

Since the start of the 2000s, the China has become an increasingly important player on the Central Asian scene, which until then had been essentially divided between Russia and the US. Beijing has managed to make a massive and multiform entry onto the Central Asian geo-political landscape: it has proven itself a loyal partner on the level of bilateral diplomacy and has succeeded in turning the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) into a regional structure appreciated by its members. China has also become a leading actor in trade as well as in the hydrocarbon sector and infrastructure. This paper focuses on the political and geopolitical impact of Beijing's growing influence, along with the economic implications of the Chinese presence in Central Asia. Moreover, the paper assesses the extent to which this will affect the objectives of the European Union in the region. A final key question debated here is an assessment of possible joint interests of China and the EU in Central Asia.

Russia is a power unlike others in Central Asia, given its role as the region’s former coloniser, which started in the 19th century and even in the 18th for some of the northern parts of Kazakhstan. This legacy has its positive and negative aspects: it has been positive insofar as it has involved a long period of Russo–Central Asian cohabitation that has given rise to a common feeling of belonging to the same ‘civilisation’; it has been negative insofar as it has accrued all the political resentment and cultural misinterpretations of the coloniser–colonised relationship. Russian–Central Asian relations are therefore complex, with each of the actors having a highly emotional perception of its relation to the other. This paper looks at the prospects for collaboration between the EU and Russia in this region: How can the currently competitive mindset be turned into the atmosphere of cooperation that the Central Asian states actively call for?

The commercial energy relationship between the EU and Central Asia will be structured around gas above other hydrocarbons and minerals. More specifically, it would entail the provision of medium- to long-term volumes of around 15 bcm annually to supplement the core supply base from Azerbaijan’s Shah Deniz II project. The crucial Central Asian state in this equation is Turkmenistan, which alone has the requisite volume availability for export. As such, the initial finding of this paper is that Turkmenistan should be the EU’s strategic priority for engagement on energy issues. The secondary findings of this working paper are that there is both a role for the EU in Turkmenistan and a willingness on the part of the Turkmen, if only on a tactical level, to engage. The EU, with European energy companies, can up their game by: i) actively seeking to resolve the long-standing maritime boundary dispute between Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan; ii) seeking to secure a supply commitment on gas volumes from specified sources flowing through the proposed East-West pipeline; and iii) working to promote EU companies as the best technical and most environmentally responsible commercial partners to develop new onshore fields under a legal formula that protects all parties’ interests. For their part, EU energy companies must stay engaged and consider whether they would be prepared to work under commercial arrangements short of a Production-Sharing Agreement (PSA) and closer to the Joint Activity Agreement (JAA) model.

The European Union is seeking to establish a place for itself in Central Asia in the face of a Chinese presence that is growing exponentially and a Russian influence that continues to be strong. Grand speeches about the EU’s partnership with the Central Asian states notwithstanding, relations between both regions have remained rather limited. The EU strategy also aims to encourage exports, economic diversification and market-economic structures, in particular by developing public-private partnerships. The EU’s commercial involvement in Central Asia enables it to further European goals in the region. These include consolidating the overall EU-Central Asia relationship, avoiding an excessive reliance by Central Asian countries on a few markets; helping to strengthen the institutions of civil society, which in turn could speed up the arrival of a substantial European presence; developing the rule of law, the private sector and transparency in government; and finally, addressing poverty, the root cause of instability. This EUCAM working paper will thus reflect upon the pertinence of having a collective EU business and trade agenda with Central Asia, what stands to be won and lost both economically and socially, and the goals it might include. It has become essential to ascertain whether or not this agenda ought to be placed at the service of more global European strategies for promoting its social model, and if so, to what extent.