Between March 31 - April 2, members of the Republican Commission for the Development of Export Potential of Regions and Industries performed its work in districts and cities of the Surkhandarya Region in order to monitor the business in the difficult economic situation caused by the spread of coronavirus infection.

Working groups composed of heads of ministries, departments, commercial banks, local authorities and diplomatic missions of the Republic of Uzbekistan abroad, complying with the quarantine requirements, visited enterprises, talked with investment project initiators and exporters, identified problems and developed effective mechanisms to solve them directly on the site.

During the visit of the Republican Commission to the Surkhandarya Region, members studied the activities of 750 enterprises and found out problems at 406 entrepreneurs implementing investment projects as a result of this study. Targeted solutions were developed and implemented:  the existing loans were restructured for 296 enterprises, foreign specialists were sent to Uzbekistan to 69 enterprises to install equipment, 9 entrepreneurs received lands, buildings and facilities, 6 enterprises were connected to utilities. Other problems have been also resolved.

In addition, members conducted a deep and detailed analysis of the business of all 155 exporting enterprises and it showed that 54 entrepreneurs had problems: 14 entrepreneurs needed new loans in order to replenish working capital, 4 ones had no foreign customers for exporting products and 37 ones had problems related to the prolongation of the term of existing loans, reimbursement of previously paid amounts of VAT, the allocation of land, and the uninterrupted electricity and gas supply. All identified problems were resolved promptly by means of close coordination of the responsible government entities and the active participation of commercial banks.

The Commission will continue working with business representatives of the Surkhandarya Region on the basis of established mechanisms for interagency cooperation, which will significantly reduce the negative impact of global crisis phenomena in the global economy on social and economic processes in the region’s economy.

Upon summing up the results of the work in the Surkhandarya Region, the Commission went to the Kashkadarya Region to provide effective and targeted support to entrepreneurs in that region.