We will strengthen efforts to create comfortable and attractive environment for investors

Address

by the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan H.E. Mr. Shavkat Mirziyoyev

at the Opening Ceremony of the First Tashkent International Investment Forum

Dear heads of delegations!

Dear guests!

Ladies and gentlemen!

I sincerely welcome all of you, distinguished participants of the First Tashkent International Investment Forum, to the hospitable land of Uzbekistan.

It gives me a profound pleasure to see the heads of international organizations, financial institutions and leading global companies, as well as high representatives of countries - our main partners at today’s forum.

Welcome to Uzbekistan!

Esteemed forum participants!

For many centuries, the land of Uzbekistan has attracted merchants and entrepreneurs, business people from different countries and regions of the world.

Our land, located at the center of the Great Silk Road, has been known since ancient times for the fact that there were caravan routes connecting different parts of the world - Asia, Europe and Africa. It was on the territory of ancient Maverannahr, where modern Uzbekistan is located, that there was a mutual enrichment of civilizations and cultures formed in China, India, Iran, Byzantium and Egypt. As a result, our country with more than 3,000 years of statehood, has long been one of the world’s highly developed centers of trade, economy, science, culture and art.

The great scientists and thinkers, outstanding figures of secular and religious sciences, who grew up on this ancient land, left the world with their unique discoveries and invaluable works that still serve humanity. For instance, it is historically well-known that the concept of «quarantine», which is still relevant today, was first introduced a thousand years ago by the great healer Abu Ali ibn Sino - or Avicenna, as he is called in Europe.

Indeed, you know that the term algorithm underlying modern innovations and blockchain technologies, artificial intelligence, is associated with the name of our great ancestor – Muhammad Khorezmi.

Mirzo Ulugbek, an outstanding statesman and great astronomer, built an observatory in Samarkand in the 15th century, determined the exact coordinates of more than a thousand stars and made a huge contribution to the development of science.

It is especially noteworthy that the scientific discoveries made in the past by dozens of our compatriots in physics, geodesy, chemistry, philosophy and history, architecture, fine arts, theology and other fields have not lost their significance and value today.

Distinguished ladies and gentlemen!

Our country is located in the heart of the Central Asian region, which, by virtue of its geographical location, connects North and South, West and East with main transit corridors.

We in Uzbekistan are actively continuing our economic and social development based on the principle “From a great past to a great future”.

Five years ago, when adopting the Action Strategy, we chose the path of large-scale democratic reforms. This reform programme covers all areas of the state and society, including such important areas as ensuring the rule of law, developing competition and resolutely fighting against corruption.

First of all, we began to create favorable conditions for entrepreneurship, removing all obstacles that previously prevented investors from entering the Uzbek market and freely conduct their activities.

First, in 2017 we have introduced the free convertibility of the national currency - soum and removed all restrictions on the repatriation of foreign investors’ profits.

Our banks and large enterprises have received international ratings for the first time and have entered the global financial markets. The international bonds in our national currency have also been issued on the world markets.

Along with this, we appreciate the need to continue systemic reforms in the banking and financial sector.

Second, in order to ensure a policy of openness, we have introduced a visa-free regime for the citizens of 90 foreign countries upon entry into Uzbekistan. And a simplified procedure for obtaining a visa is established to citizens of about 60 countries.

Now, it is no longer a secret that Uzbekistan in respect of these indices, has the status of the most open state in the region.

Third, the fight against corruption has become the most important priority of the state policy in Uzbekistan. In order to carry out our efforts in this direction, a separate Agency has been established.

We are continuing our work in this area, ensuring even greater transparency in the economy and we are resolutely fighting against corruption.

Fourth, we have made it a top priority to ensure and fully protect the rights and freedoms of every person in our country.

Two years ago, Uzbekistan adopted the National Human Rights Strategy and was elected a member of the UN Human Rights Council for the first time in history.

The transformation of Uzbekistan into a democratic country, where the rule of law and justice are exercised in practice, as well as an independent and strong judicial and legal system is emerging, is one of our highest goals.

Fifth, the implementation of necessary measures to develop civil society and ensure freedom of speech, and create a democratic media space is an important aspect of the country’s reforms.

We are achieving significant results in transforming the media into the “fourth power” and strengthening the public accountability of state bodies. Our most important achievement in this regard is that we are getting rid of the closed society and are building the foundation of New Uzbekistan precisely on the principles of freedom and justice.

Sixth, a forced labor, including child labor, has been completely eradicated in Uzbekistan due to which our country has been included in various “black lists” for many years. A recognition of these measures is the fact that recently the international coalition of non-governmental non-profit organizations “Cotton Campaign” and the world-known brands have cancelled the earlier boycott of the Uzbek cotton and textile products.

Seventh, since the early days of the reforms, we have been paying a special attention to the development of education and human capital.

Over the past five years, more than 21 thousand new pre-school educational institutions have been established in the country and the pre-school enrollment has increased from 27% to 67%.

In addition, approximately 200 new schools have been built. More than 3,000 existing schools were reconstructed and fully equipped.

In a short period of time, 82 new universities and institutes, including 23 foreign universities were established, and bringing the total to 159. The enrollment rate of school graduates in higher education increased from 9 to 28%, and our work in this direction proceeds.

The important reforms, as in all areas, are being consistently implemented in the health system. The amount of funds allocated by the state to provide hospitals and ambulance stations with medicines and necessary medical products has increased to 12 times over the past period.

Eighth, the tax policy in the country also stimulates the development of entrepreneurship.

In recent years, we have reduced the total number of taxes from 13 to 9. The property tax rates reduced by half, personal income and social tax rates have been halved. At the same time, about 6 thousand rates of customs duties on imports were reduced. Furthermore, over the past 5 years, about 200 licenses and permits have been canceled or simplified.

On a systematic basis, the measures are maintained on further reduction of the tax burden on businesses and improvement of the tax administration.

Ninth, on the basis of the «one stop shop» principle, a completely new system has been introduced for working with foreign investors in Uzbekistan, the activities of the Ministry of Investment and Foreign Trade have been established, which provides comprehensive assistance to investors, covering all regions and industries. The annual volume of foreign investment in our economy has increased to 3,5 times and over the past 5 years their total volume has reached to $25 billion. The implementation of 59 thousand investment projects thanks to this has made a worthy contribution to the creation of more than 2,5 million new jobs.

We have also managed to raise to a quality new level the processing of raw materials in textile, leather-shoe, pharmaceutical, electrical, chemical and petrochemical industries, the production of construction materials and many other industries and increase the volume of annual exports to almost $20 billion.

Tenth, two years ago, for the first time in the history of the country, we have set the task of elimination poverty as one of the main goals of government policy.

A special strategy was adopted in this direction and the Ministry of Economic Development and Poverty Reduction was established. As a result, in a short time we have managed to withdraw more than half a million families from the category of those in need.

In general, our work over the past 5 years has given positive results. It is confirmed that in the first years of the reforms, the average annual growth of the economy was 5% and of industry 8%. Our foreign exchange reserves rose from $27 billion to $35 billion.

Even in 2020, in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the GDP growth remained positive and in 2021 the GDP growth exceeded 7%, which indicates the accuracy of the reform path we chose. And this inspires us to secure the new frontiers.

Distinguished Forum participants!

The changes in Uzbekistan have actually become irreversible, and this can be called with confidence the most important achievement of reforms in our country over the past five years.

We have recently adopted the New Uzbekistan Development Strategy for the next 5 years. It is based on the principle of «Human Interests Above All» and is aimed at solving such important tasks as the development of a free civil society and human capital, further stimulating entrepreneurial activity, protecting the rights of investors, ensuring the inviolability of private property and gender equality.

The ultimate goal of our strategy is the realization of the fundamental idea «In the name of human honor and dignity» in all spheres and areas of life of our state and society.

These directions are as follows.

The first direction – the consistent continuation of measures to ensure economic and political stability in the country.

In particular, it provides the creation of the most favorable conditions for business through implementation of the large-scale administrative reforms and digitalization, the creation of a compact and highly efficient government system that will support businesses and entrepreneurs by increasing the effectiveness of the state management system.

The second direction – a drastic reduction in the participation and share of the state in the economy.

Privatization of state assets with the support of international financial institutions and foreign consulting companies will eliminate the monopoly in more than 25 activities by 2026 due to the abolition of exclusive rights and privatization of state enterprises. The transformation of banks into commercial banks will continue and the share of the private sector in banking assets will increase to 60%. The number of state enterprises will be reduced to at least 3 times.

Taking this opportunity, I would like to tell you, esteemed investors and entrepreneurs, that we will create all conditions for your wide participation in privatization processes on the principles of openness, transparency and competition.

The third direction – the continuation of intensive infrastructure development in the country.

Based on the introduction of public-private partnership mechanisms, it is planned to implement more than 200 projects in Uzbekistan for a total amount of $15 billion in the energy, transport, health, education, infrastructure development and road construction. We invite all of you to actively participate in these processes and implement the mutually beneficial projects.

The fourth direction – to stimulate the production of goods with high added value owing to the advanced processing of our rich raw materials as a part of the industrialization of the economy.

As it is well-known, Uzbekistan is among 20 countries of the world with huge reserves of various minerals. In particular, our country ranks 2nd in the world in terms of a gold resource base, 7th in terms of copper reserves, 8th in tungsten, 9th in silver, 12th in uranium and 16th in natural gas production.

The specific projects for the advanced processing of these raw materials have been developed, which will attract $120 billion investments in such areas as chemistry and gas chemistry, copper processing, electronics, pharmaceutical, textile and many other industries in the next 5 years.

The fifth – is investing in human capital.

In the next five years, in the preschool education, the level of coverage shall be increased from the current 67 to 80% by creating more than 7 thousand new kindergartens. Based on foreign best practices, curriculum and textbooks for the school system will be completely revised. The new schools will be built for 1.2 million student places. The level of higher education coverage will reach 50%.

The priority task in this direction is to improve the system of vocational education based on advanced international standards, as well as specialize in accordance with the modern requirements of highly qualified personnel in the information technology and engineering for the needs of the economy.

An example of our practical work in this direction is the project «One million coders» implemented jointly with the Government of the United Arab Emirates. Our goal is to provide in full the industry-drivers of the national economy with highly qualified specialists.

It should be especially noted that today apart from economic resources, Uzbekistan has a great human potential, personnel of a new formation with modern knowledge and proficiency in foreign languages. This is our greatest wealth.

The sixth direction is further liberalization of the country’s foreign trade, the creation of additional favorable conditions for the export-import activities.

Uzbekistan is taking concrete steps to become a full member of the World Trade Organization in the coming years. At present, the national producers have already an access to the regional markets with 280 million consumers in a free trade regime.

In addition, more than six thousand types of goods from Uzbekistan can be exported to the European markets on preferential terms under the expanded system of EU’s «GSP+».

Furthermore, the negotiations are underway to sign preferential and Free Trade Agreements with India, Turkey, the Republic of Korea and other countries to create additional opportunities for our exporters.

In order to diversify existing transport corridors, the practical efforts are being made to create opportunities for the supply of goods produced in Uzbekistan to South Asia via the Trans-Afghan railway, to the Asia–Pacific region via the Uzbekistan–Kyrgyzstan–China railway, to the European countries via multimodal transport corridors through the South Caucasus.

The seventh direction is increasing the investment attractiveness of the country and further improving the business environment.

In order to generate practical proposals for the development of this sector, regular meetings of the Foreign Investors Council under the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan will be held from 2022.

We shall continue the practice of a direct dialogue with investors and entrepreneurs in all industries and regions, using the crowdsourcing platform and modern digital solutions.

The Entrepreneur’s Day is celebrated on August 20 in our country. The direct dialogue of the President with entrepreneurs will take place on this day. I am pleased to invite all investors and entrepreneurs, participating in today’s forum, to take part in the upcoming dialogue with their questions and suggestions.

In general, it is envisaged that due to the implementation of reforms in the next 5 years, GDP will increase to $100 billion, and the volume of annual exports will double to $30 billion. The share of the private sector in GDP will reach 80%.

We have set a clear goal – to enter a number of countries with an above-average income in the world by 2030.

Dear friends!

The challenges caused by the pandemic, the current difficulties in the economy and other problems that the whole world has faced in recent years, teach us to make non-standard decisions, work in new conditions and achieve concrete results.

Uzbekistan is a peaceful and safe place to live and work even in today’s difficult situation in the world.

We will further intensify our efforts to create comfortable and attractive conditions for investors. The most difficult task in the course of reforms is not only to change legislation or develop strategies, which is also important, but also the main thing is to change people’s worldview and thinking. I think all reformers in the world will agree with this.

The team (they are the heads of ministries, departments and local authorities) of the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan is also present in this hall today. All of them are highly qualified specialists with a modern outlook, representatives of the New Uzbekistan. During the preparation for this forum, I gave them specific instructions. These leaders are ready to work continuously to establish practical and mutually beneficial cooperation with you, esteemed guests, participants of the forum, to support the new projects of mutually beneficial partnership, most importantly, to create a comprehensively favorable environment for investors and entrepreneurs.

The forum is also attended by the heads of leading industry associations, private companies and enterprises of Uzbekistan, who are ready to expand cooperation with our foreign partners.

Furthermore, more than 30 events will be held as a part of the forum. Over 200 attractive project proposals, extensive information on current conditions and new prospects for successful business in Uzbekistan will be presented to your attention.

Distinguished investors!

Ladies and gentlemen!

It is well-known that today the entire world economy is moving towards digitalization. The «green» technologies and innovations are a priority in any industry and business. In such conditions, when there are huge opportunities for business and entrepreneurship, expansion of international economic ties, I would like to invite you to practical cooperation with New Uzbekistan – a country, which is the cradle of ancient civilization and culture, is confidently on the path of renewal and reform today.

The President and the Government of Uzbekistan will guarantee your successful activity in our country.

I call on all of you to take active practical actions to implement common large-scale tasks, to bring our mutually beneficial partnership to a new, even higher level.

I wish all the participants of the forum an effective work and the achievement of new agreements as a part of this, as well as success in your future endeavors.

Thank you for your attention.