The delegation of the Ministry of Economy and Finance participated in the Uzbek-Turkish Business Forum in Ankara

This high-level meeting drew 500 attendees, including corporate representatives from both countries, investors, foreign experts, and specialists.

For reference, it should be noted that in 2017-2023, the number of business entities in Uzbekistan trading with Turkey doubled and amounted to almost 5,200. These companies operate in industries such as energy, construction, textiles, tourism, pharmaceuticals, healthcare, agriculture, and construction materials.

In 2023, an agreement on preferential trade was signed between the Republic of Uzbekistan and the Republic of Turkey. If at the end of last year the volume of mutual trade in 12 goods established under the agreement increased by 30%, then in January-April of this year the volume of trade in these goods increased by another 12%.

The agenda of the event included negotiations and presentations with potential leaders of Turkish companies aimed at the development of public-private partnerships, privatisation, mining and geology, inter-territorial cooperation between the two countries and reforms in these areas, as well as new projects in the industrial sector.

Following the session on public-private partnerships, memoranda of understanding were signed with ten potential Turkish enterprises to help with the preparation and implementation of initiatives in these areas (based on the Swiss Challenge). Ministry representatives also gave a presentation targeted at luring Turkish entrepreneurs to tenders that would be released in 2024-2025.

The event’s agenda included discussions about collaboration with Turkish enterprises in agriculture, energy, healthcare, textiles, geology, electrical engineering, pharmaceuticals, and construction. The issues of forming new joint agricultural projects in our country’s Samarkand, Tashkent, Khorezm, and Bukhara regions, presenting the tourism potential of these regions, and attracting Turkish entrepreneurs to new tourism infrastructure projects were specifically addressed.

To round off the forum, the participants were presented an exhibition of textile, jewellery, construction, leather and other products of Uzbekistan. The business forum also included B2B meetings, which allowed for a detailed discussion of specific issues of close and mutually beneficial co-operation.

Within the framework of the forum, a number of agreements were reached aimed at further expanding mutually beneficial cooperation between the Uzbek-Turkish economic and business circles. In particular, a number of agreements and memorandums were signed on the creation of industrial clusters, support for the energy sector, construction of power plants, textile and leather-footwear production, construction of roads, schools and pre-school educational institutions on the basis of public-private partnerships.

The event marked a significant step towards developing Turkish-Uzbek commercial and economic relations, offering up new potential for cooperative projects and investments in a variety of economic areas.