On May 10, President Shavkat Mirziyoyev was familiarised with a presentation of measures to reduce poverty and increase employment in Uzbekistan.
At the event it was said that in the renewed Constitution the state has committed itself to poverty reduction, so measures to bring this work to a new level were discussed. Above all, the Ministry of Employment and Poverty Reduction should organise the work on the ground in a new way, the President said.
The event also focused on how to support entrepreneurs and motivate them to generate new jobs. For this purpose, they will sign contracts to train a qualified workforce. Businesses will have monocentres established in them. The state will offer preferential access to infrastructure, credit, tax and other issues, in addition to allocating funds for training workers. The entrepreneur, on his/her part, will provide the poor with productive employment.
The President has instructed decision makers to implement this system in all the districts and cities.
The meeting’s agenda included a discussion on China’s successful poverty reduction strategies. A delegation from Uzbekistan had recently visited China to gain insight and devise new approaches. Subsequently, the Ministry of Employment and Poverty Reduction enlisted the aid of Chinese experts.
It has been determined that a separate program on poverty reduction will be implemented in one of the districts of each region based on the Chinese experience. Attention will be paid to improving road, energy, communication and tourism infrastructure, the development of small and medium-sized towns, and the industrialisation of mahallas in areas with high levels of poverty.
The Deputy Prime Minister has been tasked with addressing issues related to preparation of necessary infrastructure.
In 2023 13 trillion soums of loans and 1.5 trillion soums of subsidies will be allocated for family entrepreneurship. In the area of poverty reduction and employment 37 types of subsidies have been introduced, but “the conditions of this support are almost the same for all and do not take into account the different socio-economic situation of families, the time required for projects to reach self-sufficiency.”
In this regard, it was proposed to change the procedure for granting loans and subsidies, providing for an individual approach to each low-income family.
The President instructed to turn the Ministry of Employment and Poverty Reduction into a “people-oriented system” and to organize the provision of more than 100 social services directly in the mahallas.
