On September 12-13 this year, the Government Commission for the Development of Export and Investment headed by Deputy Prime Minister of the Republic of Uzbekistan S. Umurzakov and involving the heads of ministries, departments, industry associations, commercial banks, and local authorities summed up the work on the review of investment, industrial and export opportunities of the regions and the development of priority measures to comprehensively use the existing economic potential of the Jizzakh and Syrdarya regions. The relevant working groups worked off-site in in these regions from September 8 to 13.

During the week, they visited enterprises in Jizzakh region and reviewed the state of all 2,596 industrial facilities, and 2,103 facilities in Syrdarya region.

This resulted in identification of 598 enterprises faced with problems in production. Among them, 303 enterprises required credit resources to replenish working capital and purchase engineering equipment, 97 - connection to utility lines, 51 - raw materials for production, 36 - permits and licenses. They also identified the need to resolve issues related to the allocation of land plots, assistance in the return of previously paid VATs, repayment of receivables and restructuring of payments on previously received loans.

In order to promptly resolve the issues identified, each enterprise in both regions received the assigned heads of the relevant industry departments and associations, commercial banks and khokimiyats of districts and cities of the region responsible for the implementation of targeted measures to support and accelerate the bringing of production facilities to design capacity.

The members of working groups revised regional investment programs of the two regions. They selected the most promising economically investment projects characterized by high rates of production, exports and the number of jobs created. The implementation of these projects will be accelerated in order to put them into operation by the end of this year.

Jizzakh region investment program includes 608 investment projects worth UZS 14.7 trillion, of which it is planned to implement 433 projects worth UZS 3.2 trillion. After the optimization, the terms of commissioning of 15 promising projects worth UZS 222.5 billion were postponed from 2021 to 2020. There were also developed 39 new cost-effective projects worth UZS 68.6 billion.

Syrdarya region plans to implement 668 projects worth UZS 10.4 trillion by the end of this year. The revision of the program for 2020 resulted in postponement of 28 highly productive projects worth UZS 132.9 billion.

The Government Commission developed a number of projects aimed at import substitution of products that are widely demanded in local markets and used by domestic industrial enterprises.

Jizzakh region localization program for 2020 provides implementation of 50 projects worth UZS 312.7 billion, and for 2021 - 4 projects worth UZS 377.2 billion. The members of the Government Commission additionally developed 36 import-substituting projects worth UZS 339.6 billion in the production of construction materials, chemical, textile, food, electrical, pharmaceutical products, as well as in the mechanical engineering, which will create more than 3 thousands of new jobs in addition to significant increase in industrial production.

There were 13 new investment projects developed worth UZS 145.3 billion in addition to already planned 34 projects for the localization of production worth UZS 645.5 billion.

There was an individual work in the clustering of the industry of the two regions, in particular, in Jizzakh region, it is planned to create 18 industrial clusters in 7 areas, such as food, textile, pharmaceutical and chemical industries, as well as the production of construction materials, leather and silk products. The creation of these clusters resulted in implementation of 37 projects worth UZS 2.9 trillion and generation of value added chains for the production of goods worth UZS 1.7 trillion. This will also create an additional 5,000 new jobs.

On the same principle, Syrdarya region will implement 23 new projects worth about UZS 41 trillion in the textile, leather, footwear, fish farming, food and pharmaceutical industries.

Uzstandart agency will take measures to create test laboratories and centers for training, retraining and advanced training of workers in the created industrial clusters in Jizzakh and Syrdarya regions.

Working groups also reviewed current operation and developed measures to increase the efficiency of the potential of free economic and small industrial zones in two regions.

Currently, there are Jizzakh Free Economic Zone implementing 5 projects worth USD 209.5 million and Zomin-Pharm Free Economic Zone implementing 5 projects worth USD 613.2 million operating in Jizzakh region. There are also 12 small industrial zones in the region, which plan to implement 67 industrial facilities totaling UZS 769.6 billion with 38 projects worth UZS 208.8 billion already implemented and provided 600 new jobs. It is planned to implement 29 projects worth UZS 560.8 billion by the end of this year. Besides, 8 new small industrial zones are at the stage of formation. It is planned to allocate UZS 29.1 billion to provide the existing and created small industrial zones with the necessary infrastructure by the end of the year. Also, the Government Commission developed a proposal to create 1 additional small industrial zone with 30 investment projects on its area.

There is the Syrdarya Free Economic Zone in Syrdarya region, where 24 projects worth USD 163.9 million were implemented and 3 thousand jobs were created, as well as 8 small industrial zones with 13 projects planned to be implemented by the end of this year and worth UZS 32.2 billion, including the creation of 1.6 thousand new jobs.   By the end of this year, these zones with receive UZS 21.2 billion to provide required engineering lines.

The restoration of idle industrial enterprises and the commissioning of new investment projects in Jizzakh region will provide additional reserves for industrial output, which will ensure the increase of industrial production to UZS 5.8 trillion or 119% of the approved indicators. This will also create more than 18 thousand jobs and provide tax revenues to the budget amounted to UZS 1.2 trillion, which will amount to 112% of the approved indicators.

The measures developed during the work of the Government Commission in Syrdarya region will increase the industrial output up to UZS 413 billion or 101.2% as related to the forecast indicators, will create about 10 thousand new jobs, and provide revenues to the budget amounted to UZS 721.9 billion, namely 107.8% of the approved indicators.

The General Prosecutor's Office will regularly monitor the quality and timely execution of the planned activities. The Government Commission will consider the progress of programs developed on separate meeting on a monthly basis.