SEPT. 10 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — In line with a general liberalisation policy, the Uzbek authorities said that they were scrapping excise duties on several imported products. These included natural resin, wire of non-alloy steel, non-woven fabric, drops and solutions for contact lenses, video recording equipment and other products, Azerbaijan’s Trend news agency reported.
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— This story was first published in issue 343 of The Conway Bulletin on Sept. 15 2017
SEPT. 12 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Farmers in Uzbekistan are being given subsidies to diversify their crops away from cotton, Eurasianet reported by quoting local officials and farmers. Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev wants to stabilise fruit and vegetable price and this means encouraging farmers to ditch cotton. This year, Eurasianet reported, 400sqkm of cotton fields are being taken out harvest and another 1,000sqkm next year. Uzbekistan currently has 13,000sqkm of cotton fields and is one of the world’s biggest producers.
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— This story was first published in issue 343 of The Conway Bulletin on Sept. 15 2017
SEPT. 13 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — In Tashkent, 50 chefs cooked up a traditional plov that weighed 7.3 tonnes, setting a new world record for the biggest plov ever cooked. The previous record was 4 tonnes.
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— This story was first published in issue 343 of The Conway Bulletin on Sept. 15 2017
SEPT. 6 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan officially reopened the Dostuk (Friendship) border crossing point that has been closed since ethnic fighting in Osh, Kyrgyzstan, in 2010. The Dostuk checkpoint is one of the most important in the Ferghana Valley and its reopening is considered a major indicator of improved relations between Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan.
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— This story was first published in issue 343 of The Conway Bulletin on Sept. 15 2017
SEPT. 4 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Iran has lifted an export tax on foodstuffs being sent to Central Asia and the South Caucasus, media quoted Abdollah Mohajer, the head of Mazandaran Province Chamber of Commerce, as saying. The export tax had covered a range of products including pistachio nuts, cabbages, dates and raisins. Ditching the export tax is likely to drop the price of sending foodstuffs to Central Asia by up to 20%. Iran is increasingly trying to tap into Central Asia and the South Caucasus as natural export markets for is various products.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 342, published on Sept. 7 2017)
TASHKENT, SEPT. 5 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Uzbekistan released its soum currency from decade-long controls that have artificially bolstered its strength and allowed a Black Market to flourish.
Officially, the soum dropped by nearly 50% to trade at around 8,000/$1, roughly the Black Market level prior to the announcement that currency controls were to be lifted.
President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, in power since September last year, wants to increase civil liberties and he saw the dual currency rates as holding back investment. The currency controls effectively made investing in Uzbekistan twice as expensive for foreign companies as it should have been.
A Conway Bulletin correspondent in Tashkent said that hundreds of ordinary Uzbeks queued to exchange Uzbek soum into US dollars at banks and official exchange points rather than through Black Market dealers in the city’s bazaars.
While most people were happy that the currency controls had been lifted, others were more cautious. One of the main gripes was that the government would only allow the exchanges to go through on special bank cards, rather than through cash.
“Currency can only be bought on a conversion card, not cash? I mean you sell your dollars to the bank in cash, but you can buy it only on the card?” one man queuing at a bank said.
“The question is – what’s the use of it? After all, with the same success, I can buy currency on the Black Market and go abroad and spend it there with the same success. When will they start selling foreign currency in cash?”
Others were more upbeat.
“It is clear that the first stage of the reform will begin to work now. And I hope after some time we will be allowed to buy dollars in cash,” another man said.
Nearby, though, the impact of scrapping the currency controls was being felt in other ways. In an area of Tashkent’s biggest bazaar usually crowded with money changers, only policemen stood idly. The currency Black Market, so long a feature of Uzbek life, has been, at least temporarily, put out of business. Some people, though, ruefully said that it could rebound.
“The Black Market will eventually come back if cash cannot be bought in banks,” one woman said.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 342, published on Sept. 7 2017
SEPT. 1 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev plans to visit Turkey in October, media reported by quoting Turkish government officials. The meeting will be one of Mr Mirziyoyev’s most significant since taking office in September 2016. Relations between Uzbekistan and Turkey under Mr Mirziyoyev’s predecessor, Islam Karimov, were strained. Turkey, though, is prominent in the region and can play a more involved role in Uzbekistan’s affairs.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 342, published on Sept. 7 2017)
SEPT. 7 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — It’s all eyes on the Uzbek soum after the Central Bank said last week that it would converge the dual currency exchange rate system that has been operating since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Under that system, the Black Market rate of the soum was roughly half the official rate.
And so it proved. As soon as controls over the official rate were scrapped, it fell by 48% to 8,100/$1. The unofficial rate, as measured by the uzdollar.com, remained pretty much steady at around 7,700/$1.
In reality, the economic shock of ditching support for an official exchange rate will be limited. Currency controls previously meant that the Black Market rate had been widely used. Uzbeks were used to a rate of around 7,700/$1 to 8,800/1.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 342, published on Sept. 7 2017)
AUG. 28 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — The authorities in Uzbekistan scrapped broadcasting live TV shows, programming that had been considered essential for displaying the country’s new era of openness under President Shavkat Mirziyoyev. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported that PM Abdulla Aripov wrote to journalists earlier in August explaining the policy change without giving specific reasons. Uzbekistan has looked to open up under Mr Mirziyoyev and has started broadcasting a 24-hour news channel.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 342, published on Sept. 7 2017)
— Progress can still be derailed but so far, and only one year into the job, President Shavkat Mirziyoyev’s reforms in Uzbekistan have looked pretty good, writes Bulletin editor James Kilner
SEPT. 7 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — In the year that Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev has been running Uzbekistan, he has done more to open up the country than even the most optimistic observer could have imagined in Sept. 2016.
On paper, at least.
Mirziyoyev has released a number of political prisoners and mended relations with neighbours but the main structural changes, other than scrapping currency controls, that should propel Uzbekistan into the 21st century, are still to come.
Under Islam Karimov, Uzbekistan had been trapped in a sort of USSR time-warp. Mirziyoyev has promised to unravel this iron casing.
He has scrapped the dual currency system that made it more expensive to buy the soum on the official market, made noises about making it easier for foreign investors to take money out of the country and signed various decrees that will ditch the hated external passports needed to leave the country.
But these remain, in the large part, promises. Still, this is a better, more open, start than many people had expected when the former PM emerged as Karimov’s successor.
He quickly shored up his power-base by demoting his main rival to the top job former economy minister Rustam Azimov.
And he has made sure that he has struck a genuinely popular note with ordinary Uzbeks, going out to the regions and promising to invest in infrastructure projects that will create jobs and trade deals with neighbours which should generate wealth for people living in Central Asia’s most populous country.
Mirziyoyev has also done something that Karimov was always too afraid to do. He has reached out to pious Muslims. While Karimov tried to drive Islam underground, Mirziyoyev was pictured breaking the Ramadan fast with religious leaders. A huge olive branch.
Mirziyoyev has promised much to many in his first year in power. In his second year he needs to deliver on his promises.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 342, published on Sept. 7 2017