Women of Tajikistan

Central Asia's Tajikistan does not have the best record when it comes to women's rights, safety, or legal protections; but the country has one specific professional sector in which Tajik women enjoy high employment, respect, and workplace protections: border security.

     When Tajikistan began increasing security along the border with Afghanistan, 90% of its border security were men, but the Tajik authorities quickly discovered female border security agents far surpassed their male counterparts in identifying victims of human trafficking- convincing the government to amplify efforts to hire and train more female border guards to eliminate attempts at human trafficking from Afghanistan.

     Since then, women working for the border security agency have leveraged their positions to successfully campaign for increased workplace respect, benefits, and protections within a larger nation-wide culture slowly evolving to improve the lives of women across the country.