Muloqot.gov.uz

President of the Republic of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev held an open dialog with entrepreneurs in New Tashkent on August 20.

The head of our state congratulated businessmen on their professional holiday and the 34th anniversary of independence. He emphasized their huge contribution to the transformation in every sector, every region and every mahalla.

Over the past eight years, many sectors of the economy have been re-shaped. During this period, 230 billion dollars of investments have been attracted, of which more than 120 billion are foreign. In the first half of this year, our country's economy grew by 7.2 percent.

Thanks to the creation of favorable conditions for doing business, the number of entrepreneurs and the scale of their activities have increased. For example, 1,600 micro-enterprises increased their turnover to more than 10 billion soums during the year and immediately moved to the category of medium-sized enterprises, 143 - exceeded the turnover of 100 billion soums and became large companies. Another 122 small enterprises became large companies.

As a result of measures to bring business out of the shadow in 139 thousand companies the number of jobs increased by 811 thousand, in 273 thousand companies the labor remuneration fund increased by 22 percent. If last year the average salary in the private sector amounted to 4 million soums, today it is approaching 5 million soums.

It was noted that since the first open dialog almost a thousand initiatives of entrepreneurs have been enshrined in legislation. The current meeting was the fifth in number. In the course of preparation for it, meetings were held with almost 7 thousand representatives of 26 industries, more than 13 thousand appeals and proposals were received through the "call center".

In recent weeks, the issues related to the key sectors of the economy - fruit and vegetable, textile and individual entrepreneurship - have been discussed and support measures have been defined.

At today's dialog the head of state put forward new initiatives in other areas of entrepreneurship as well.

First of all, the service sector will be actively developed as the most effective area for creating short-term and quick-paying jobs. A new program for the development of tourism is being launched. In the next three years, 5 thousand hectares of land will be auctioned for the organization of hotels and tourist facilities. At the same time, entrepreneurs wishing to build a hotel will not be charged for the land - the state will enter the project as a co-founder for the amount of the cost of the land plot.

Entrepreneurs will be able to buy out this share within ten years at any time. If payment is made at once, a 20 percent discount will be provided. Loans for the construction of hotels will be allocated for seven years with a two-year grace period.

Many entrepreneurs are already acquiring public and private properties and converting them into hotels. Now the subsidies envisaged for the construction of new hotels will be provided to them as well. In addition, hotels located outside Tashkent, regional centers and major tourist zones are exempted from paying tourist tax.

If earlier family guest houses could receive no more than 10 tourists per day, now this limit is doubled.

The President proposed to hold a contest among domestic hotels and family guesthouses. The prize fund of the contest will amount to 1 million dollars, and the best facilities that have received the largest number of positive reviews on reputable international platforms will be rewarded annually.

Due to infrastructure development, the number of major tourist zones will be increased. Thus, large year-round resort zones will be created in Chartak, Fergana, Baisun and Nurabad districts.

This year, more than 1 trillion soums have been allocated for accelerated development of 16 districts. In the future, at the expense of 500 million dollars, similar projects will be implemented in other districts. This will create great opportunities for entrepreneurs in industry, services and construction, as well as tens of thousands of jobs.

Businesses also need additional space. In this regard, from next year state assets will be leased for five years.

It is noted that the Law "On Lease", adopted in 1991, was mainly aimed at protecting the interests of state bodies. In this regard, a new version of the law will be developed, which will equally protect the rights of the lessor and the lessee.

New opportunities in education and medicine were also identified at the meeting.

In particular, in 80 districts with low coverage of preschool education, entrepreneurs will be granted incentives. They will be allowed to build kindergartens on vacant land of preschool institutions and schools on the terms of public-private partnership. In this case, the land rent will not be charged for 30 years. The state will subsidize half of the costs for each child envisaged in public kindergartens. Also, favorable loans will be granted to enterprising entrepreneurs, and the social tax rate for them will be only 1 percent.

For entrepreneurs creating medical clusters, loans will be provided for 7 years with a three-year grace period at an annual interest rate of 17 percent.

The President emphasized that the most important tool to support business is financial services. In this regard, an investment platform will be created for simplified attraction of funds for projects. With its help, entrepreneurs will be able to attract up to 1 billion dollars a year.

Today there are more than 600 startups operating in Uzbekistan. In the first seven months of this year alone, they attracted a record volume of 264 million dollars in foreign investment.

This work will continue: it is planned to commercialize a thousand startup ideas of young people, of which 200 will be brought to the international market. On the basis of advanced technologies, 100 local startups will turn into attractive world-class businesses. 100 million dollars are allocated for this purpose.

Starting this year, the "Young Entrepreneurs" championship will be launched. The 100 best ideas will be selected and up to 1 billion soums will be invested in each startup.

To expand digital financial services, a five-year strategy will be adopted to introduce a new ecosystem - "open banking".

Next year, banks will raise 1 billion dollars for targeted support to SMEs on favorable terms. An alternative scoring model will be introduced, which will ease the conditions for obtaining loans.

The meeting also addressed the issues of tax administration.

Currently, enterprises with annual turnover over 10 billion soums have to pay advance payments of profit tax, which creates difficulties with working capital. Now this procedure will be applied only for turnover above 20 billion soums. As a result, 14 thousand entrepreneurs will have additional 1 trillion soums of working capital.

Enterprises switching from turnover tax to VAT are exempted from paying income tax for one year. Even in case of errors in reporting, fines will not be applied. In addition, a part of accountants' salaries up to 5 million soums for six months will be deducted from taxes paid by such enterprises.

Two years ago, a system of accounting was introduced for "simplified" taxpayers by tax officials. From next year, entrepreneurs will be freed from the obligation to prepare reports on land, property, social and income taxes - they will be prepared free of charge by the tax authorities. Business will be able to make corrections to the reporting within 5 days.

It is known that business develops where the rule of law is in force. In recent years, modern investment instruments have been introduced into the economy - venture capital, bonds, crowdfunding, startups. These relations are currently regulated by dozens of documents.

The President proposed to unite all these regulations into a single document of direct action - to adopt the Investment Code. It will unite all the rules, guarantees and procedures in the investment sphere and will help stimulate investment.

The head of state also announced another important news: from 2026, the principle of "Start a business in 15 minutes" will be introduced. Upon registration, an entrepreneur will immediately be provided with an electronic digital signature, a bank account and a notification to state authorities.

The list of goods subject to mandatory certification has been reduced to 459 items and will be reduced by another 288.

For 32 categories of goods - such as seedlings, mineral fertilizers, footwear, livestock feed under sanitary, veterinary and quarantine control - certificates of conformity will be abolished.

In general, the national infrastructure related to ensuring the safety and quality of products and their evaluation will be radically reformed and brought in line with international standards. First of all, the practice of declaration of conformity will be widely introduced instead of certification.

The system of technical regulation will be completely transformed: the object of control will be not the entrepreneur, but the product itself.

It has been noted that all of these opportunities are already in force today.

The President emphasized that the tasks set are ambitious but achievable thanks to the current entrepreneurial spirit in our country.

The meeting continued in the format of an open dialog. Entrepreneurs participating from central and regional studios expressed their suggestions and comments. Problematic issues were discussed, on which the responsible persons were given appropriate instructions.