Fifty grants have been awarded under the Family Entrepreneurship Development and Small and Medium-Sized Entrepreneurship Development Programmes; 31 grants to regional NGOs for the support of socially-oriented projects; 10 certificates to people in charge of the project “Alternative Energy Sources for the Support of the Social Sector Representatives”; 11 winners of the Contest “Modern Uzbek Village Woman” have been saluted; and the winner of the Woman of the Year National Contest – Saida Mirzarakhimova, a chief doctor from Chirchik city – has been honored.

The major ceremony also included an exhibition of items and commodities by 100 women-farmers from all regions of Uzbekistan who had participated in the Contest “Modern Uzbek Village Woman” and grant programmes of Mehr Nuri Foundation.

The official part of the ceremony featured presentations of each of the six projects. One such initiative, “Alternative Energy Sources for the Support of the Social Sector Representatives”, aims to introduce renewable sources of energy to Uzbekistan`s system of energy provision by installing module systems that run on solar and wind energy. The systems would be set up within farming households and objects of social significance. Ten of the 30 social objects – rural medical posts, crafts workshops and farming households in remote rural areas – have been selected as recipients of the wind energy generating devices and solar batteries.

The focus then shifted on the second stage of the Grant Program to Support Social Projects of Regional NGOs launched by the SISF and the Fund Forum. The Expert Council picked 31 of the 72 project proposals submitted and made available 61,696,728 soums. A variety of events have been held in each region of the country under the Program. These include training sessions on strategic planning, resource management, fundraising, social partnership development and project plan making.

“Support of Women-Farmers” and “Modern Uzbek Village Woman” Programs have been run by the SISF since 2007. In 2010, 713 women from 10 regions have been provided with concessional microcredits and loans under the “Support of Women-Farmers” Program. The project participants created around 3,000 jobs. As of 2010, the total amount of credits provided is 3,228,700,000 soums. (The credits were made available by Microcreditbank, Agrobank, Xalq bank and the Rural Construction Bank).

Mehr Nuri Foundation presented 2 programs which it has been running since 2005: Family Entrepreneurship Grants, and Small and Medium-Sized Entrepreneurship and Farming Development Grants. In 2010, 407 people participated in the “Small and Medium-Sized Entrepreneurship and Farming Development Grants” Program. Twenty of them emerged as winners and were awarded grants to the tune of 30 million soums. 415 people participated in the “Family Entrepreneurship Development Grants” Programme, which seeks to support women from remote rural areas planning to start their own business. The thirty winners of the programme were provided with 30 million soums worth of grants.

The event concluded with Gulnara Karimova, the Chairperson of the Fund Forum, awarding the title of the Woman of the Year to Saida Mirzarakhimova, a physician from Chirchik, Tashkent region. The Contest is organized annually by the Women`s Council. The winner has been gifted automobile Matiz, an exclusively made vase and a diploma. The selection rounds for the Contest were held in October-November 2010, with over 28,000 women submitting applications, and were completed by December 11.

The music part of the ceremony featured performances by Uzbek singers Farrukh Zakirov, Zulaikho Baikhanova, Makhmud Namazov, Ozodbek Nazarbekov, Abdulla Shomagrupov, Sardor Rakhimhon as well as laureates of Yangi avlod (New generation) Children`s Creativity Festival.