To reduce the state’s participation in industry by diminishing its interest in the enterprises of the key sectors, to attract foreign direct investments for the modernization, technical and technological re-equipment of productions, and on this basis to raise production of high quality export-oriented goods, as well as to raise the role of private property in the country’s economic development, the President passed a resolution on 20 July this year "On measures to further intensify the processes of privatization and active attracting of foreign investments in 2007-2010".

To meet the said objectives, the Presidential Resolution approves the privatization programme for the next three and half years (2007-2010). According to the programme, by 2010 994 enterprises and non-production objects are to be sold for private ownership through open tenders. Of these, 363 enterprises and objects are in the key sectors of the economy (chemical, electrical, construction, energy, etc). Among them are the enterprises of the UzPakhtaSanoat Association (Uzbek Cotton Industry), UzbekNefteGaz Holding (Uzbek Oil and Gas), UzKimyoSanoat Company (Uzbek Chemical Industry), UzElTehSanoat (Uzbek Electrical Industry), UzSelHozMash Holding (Uzbek Agricultural Machinery), UzbekEnergo Company, Uzbekistan Railways Company, UzAvtoSanoat (Uzbek Auto Industry) Company, and the associations of wholesale trade, fat-and-oil, and food production companies. They will be sold on the condition that the investor takes on specific investment obligations aimed at modernization, technical and technological re-equipment of production and production of competitive, export-oriented goods.

The list also includes 109 objects belonging to the Ministry of Public Education, 101 objects of the Ministry of Healthcare, four objects of the Ministry of Culture and Sport, and three objects of the UzbekTourism Company.

Also, pursuant to the decision of the State Tender Commission, privatization will also touch 19 state-owned recreation zones and 25 summer camps located mainly in the Tashkent region.

To date the majority of the enterprises of the industrial, construction, trade and services spheres have been sold to private investors, but the government continues work on the privatization of the enterprises of key industry and attracting large investments, particularly FDI.

The forecast of the flow of foreign investments, according to the Investment Programme for 2007, in the part of the tasks given to the State Property Committee on the sale of state’s interest in the said enterprises, is estimated at US$41.4 million.

In the first half of the year, over 500 agreements on the sale of the state’s shareholdings for some US$30.1 million and 10 billion soums were signed. The sum of contracts signed with foreign investors comprised US$25.5 million and 403 million soums. Deals for US$4.4 million were made with foreign investors through the online trades. Payments were received in time on the majority of them.

The volume of works performed within the frame of denationalization and privatization of enterprises and objects totaled 50.8 billion soums. As a result the profit contributed to the state budget exceeded 3.2 billion soums.

In the first half of this year, about 300 state enterprises were privatized. Private investors have set up several limited liability companies and over 250 production enterprises on their base.

It is clear that the abovementioned resolution on the privatization programme has not only expanded the opportunities for the intensification of the privatization processes, but also opened new ways to cardinally increase the share and role of private property in the structure of the economy, and to attract foreign investments, which is deemed an important factor for economic growth and betterment of livelihood of the population.

Source: UzReport.com