INFORMATION DIGEST OF PRESS OF UZBEKISTAN # 23

February 1, 2017

FINANCE
Banks of Uzbekistan have embarked on implementation of one of primary tasks for today - broad crediting and involvement of the population in entrepreneurial activity

ENERGETICS
Last year, Uzbekistan produced about 59 billion kilowatt/hours of electricity, which is 4% more YOY

EXPORT
The Uzbek Republican Commodity Exchange (UZEX) has launched exports of cotton lint for the first time since 2010

EXHIBITON
On April 5-7, the metropolitan Uzexpocentre will host the country’s first specialized event exhibition Event Expo 2017

ART
The Eastern Tale of Uzbek Miniature

SPORT
Tough to Play with Men on an Equal?

FINANCE

Banks of Uzbekistan have embarked on implementation of one of primary tasks for today - broad crediting and involvement of the population in entrepreneurial activity
Last December, speaking at a joint meeting of both chambers of Parliament, President of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev noted that commercial banks now have to change their way of working. The state’s leader set a specific goal before the financial institutions: they should create optimal conditions for citizens to get down to entrepreneurship through the dialogue with each family.
To fulfill the task, the workers of the country’s largest credit institution - Agrobank – intend to visit some 1.3 million homes in 813 settlements. The bank even opened a special division for this purpose. Similar divisions were opened in bank offices in Karakalpakstan, regions and 176 branches.
Visiting families, bank representatives conduct interviews, provide details on the opportunities to start a business, take measures on short term loaning. To date, new departments and divisions of Agrobank have already hired 576 qualified specialists. In order to improve the quality of the ongoing program, the bank additionally employed over two thousand skilled workers.
The availability of such an army of officers has contributed to the first results of the large-scale campaign. The bank’s associates have already visited nearly 360,000 houses, informed about the credits allocated for starting business, and the terms of obtaining. Those who took interest in getting the funds were offered standard business projects. Besides, experts provide assistance in processing all papers.
Mailout of registered letters with specific questionnaires is another common way of banks to draw citizens’ interest to entrepreneurship. Virtually all financial institutions of the country have resorted to this method today. Over 890,000 families have already received such letters from Agrobank alone.
Given its specifics, the bank offers favorable loans for horticulture, greenhouse farming, crafts, service development in rural areas.
Numbers:
In 2016, Agrobank provided diversified farmers with 294.7 billion soums (currency rates of CB RU from 01.02.2017, 1$= 3280.25 soums) of loans. Of these, 14.9 billion soums was allocated for the establishment of livestock farms, 856 million soums – for poultry, 381 million soums – for fish farming, 6.1 billion soums – for greenhouses. Consumer loans amounted to 82.2 billion soums.
(Source: «Uzbekistan Today» newspaper)

ENERGETICS

Last year, Uzbekistan produced about 59 billion kilowatt/hours of electricity, which is 4% more YOY
Meanwhile, domestic power plants supplied 7.5 million Gcal of thermal energy. To ensure the smooth and uninterrupted electricity supply, Uzbekenergo company continued the development and upgrade of low-voltage networks and power supply facilities, built and reconstructed 840.6 km of transmission lines, installed 602 package transformer substations.
In order to reduce losses in the power supply, the company did much to introduce modern electronic electricity meters. During the year, it installed more than 419,000 three-phase and single-phase meters in legal entities, and more than 4.3 million electronic electricity meters in household consumers.
Implementation of projects on expansion of the use of alternative energy sources was another focus of the company in the past year. Work is underway on the project of construction of 100 MW solar power plant in the Samarkand region. The company has held international tender bids for the general contractor. The tender was won by a Chinese company Zhuhai Singyes Green Building Technology.
(Source: «Uzbekistan Today» newspaper)

EXPORT

The Uzbek Republican Commodity Exchange (UZEX) has launched exports of cotton lint for the first time since 2010
The products are put up for sale in the foreign exchange marketplace by O’zpahtasanoat and its regional branches. 21 standard contracts with 1 ton and 50 tons lots are currently opened for exporting various varieties of cotton lint of 2016 yield through exchange trading.
EXW and FCA are terms of delivery through the territorial terminals of O’zpahtasanoat. Stock prices for first grade cotton lint (type A) are $440 per ton, and $355.4 for second grade cotton lint (Type B).
Over three weeks since the opening of trading, Uzbekistan has exported more than three million tons of cotton lint for more than $1.2 million. Territorial branches Buhoropahtasanoat and Khorazmpahtasanoat were the sellers.
Cotton lint is short cotton fibers that remain on a cotton seed after separation of normal fibers. In fact, it is a waste product of the cotton industry and is used as a raw material for obtaining cotton wool, batting, stuffing and absorbing materials, synthetic fibers, films, coatings, paper and other products. In recent years, it has been actively used in the production of strategic industrial raw materials - high-quality pulp.
In the last five years, Uzbekistan has been the world’s sixth largest producer, and the fifth exporter of cotton fiber. Every year, nearly 100 ginneries shall harvest more than 3.4 million tons of raw cotton, the processing of which results in about 1.1 million tons of fiber, more than 1.6 million tons of seeds, lint, and other products.
(Source: «Uzbekistan Today» newspaper)

EXHIBITON

On April 5-7, the metropolitan Uzexpocentre will host the country’s first specialized event exhibition Event Expo 2017
Fashion Expo 2017, Wedding Expo 2017, Mass Media&Advertising Expo, Leisure and Entertainment, Tashkent Flora Expo 2017 rank among the registered directions of the exhibition.
“At the exhibition, participants will have the opportunity to present their potential in the event-market and provide complete information about the services they render. The exhibitors will also get acquainted with modern trends in these areas, professionals and contractors, organizers of various multipurpose events,” noted the project organizers.
The exhibition will also become a platform for creation of a database of event-agencies to be involved in the implementation of various projects, for advice on juridical, tax, banking and other legal issues with representatives of the committees, associations and relevant departments.
(Source: «Uzbekistan Today» newspaper)

ART

The Eastern Tale of Uzbek Miniature
It is a real pleasure to watch how the heroes of Uzbek love poems and legends return to life in the hands of miniature painters. One of the workshops is located at the Centre for Applied Arts in Tashkent, in a madrasah, the construction of which was donated by Sheikh AbulKasim, one of the most enlightened and respectable people of the city.
QUALITY FOR CENTURIES
Crouching over his table, the master is making a fine drawing with light and confident movements. Rice paper is normally used to make a picture or a book cover. According to KamoliddinAbdullayev, a prizewinner at a number of international folk trade festivals and exhibitions, the older the paper the more valuable it is.
‘When I was just beginning to master the art of painting miniature, my teachers trained me to use only high-quality paper in my work,’ tells the master, whose background includes study at the Republican Painting College and KamoliddinBekhzod National Institute of Painting and Design. Since then, in order to achieve high quality in my paintings, I have always used only the handmade paper manufactured by the best craftsmen, who have inherited the ancient paper production technologies from their fathers and grandfathers. The layer of special enamel such paper is covered with makes it particularly strong and resistant to external actions. These qualities allow miniatures to remain for centuries.’
FINEST WORK
The work of a miniature painter is labourious and requires much concentration. To perform it, the painter must be talented, experienced, industrious and educated. Several centuries ago, in order to illustrate a manuscript the painter had to make a miniature on a separate piece of thin paper, after which he pierced all the lines of the drawing with a needle. Then the piece of paper was put on the manuscript’s page and covered with black powder. As a result, the page now had contours of the future miniature on it.
‘Nowadays we use a pencil instead of the needle, which is faster and more convenient,’ explains Kamoliddin. ‘Step by step, we create a definite composition consisting of traditional ornaments. The ornaments are then gilded and polished manually, with the use of an authentic wolf’s fang.’
The work is revived with bright contours and colours, for which the pigments are prepared in advance. Traditionally, oxides of various metals were used in the production of the pigments. These technologies are used nowadays too.
Miniature painters attend to the preferences of contemporary connoisseurs of manual arts, particularly women. The items sold from craftsmen’s stalls include fine necklaces, bracelets and earrings decorated with miniatures.
THE MOST VIVID ART
It is hard to believe that miniature painters use only a dozen of colours, so bright and colourful are their works. The Uzbek miniature is characterized by two principal styles of the Islamic ornamentation – girikhi and islimi. According to art historian Elmira Gul, ‘geometric pattern girikhi reflected the ideas of the absolute cosmic organization. Plant ornaments islimi were associated with the Garden of Eden, the abode of God.’ Some other traditional ornaments, such as madokhil (medallions of different forms), tumor (talismans) and others are also quite common.
Continuing the traditions of the eastern miniature, contemporary painters create great murals and pictures on book covers, tables made of rare woods, pencil boxes, chessboards and caskets. However, according to another painter, KarimjonRasulov, this is another type of miniature, varnish miniature, which is highly popular today.
The materials widely used by contemporary miniature painters are suede, wood, papier-mache and… tiny dried pumpkins.
Karimjon-aka’s workshop, for instance, features a huge number of diverse caskets, pencil boxes and spectacle cases. In their decoration he uses one of his favourite motifs – the pomegranate, which is a symbol of love and fertility. This is why people buy readily such items, which they tend to present to their friends and relatives.
Often, the works of miniature painters present the plots of well-known poems by AlisherNavoi, Omar Khayam and Firdousi and scenes from The Thousand And One Nights, as well as depict the popular heroes of Uzbek fairytales, epic stories, legends and beliefs.
Perhaps, it is the bright colours and oriental fairytales that make the miniature painting one of the most vivid types of Uzbekistan’s traditional graphic art.
(Source: “Uzbekistan Airways” magazine)

SPORT

Tough to Play with Men on an Equal?
In the Indian city of Chennai, an international competition – the 9th Chennai Open International Grandmaster Chess Tournament has taken place, which was attended by more than 300 players from 17 countries, including 19 international grandmasters.
The tournament was open, thus women have played on a par with men, including two representatives of Uzbekistan – the female grandmaster Gulruhbegim Tohirjonova and Sarvinoz Kurbanbaeva.
The start brought Gulruhbegim a success, who in the first three games scored three victories. Before the last round of chess throughout the race, it was a chance to a high place. But in the last game the Uzbek chess player lost to the international grandmaster from India S. Grover and, gaining 6.5 points out of 10, ranked only 37th.
Worse performance than the other indicators was by our chess player Sarvinoz Kurbanbaeva - she scored 5.5 points, having suffered three defeats, and was ... outside the top hundred players. And she did not compete with international grandmasters, but players whose rating was even lower than hers.
The Ukrainian grandmaster Adam Tukhaev was victoriuos who collected 8.5 points out of ten.
By the way, according to the site chess.pw, Gulruhbegim Tohirjonova was recognized "most beautiful chess player of the CIS." The winner was determined by the online vote. It seems that this victory of our 19-year-old compatriot was as prestigious as winning any other tournament. But no doubt Gulruhbegim dreams of victories on 64 cells, but in world-class tournaments.
(Source: «Uzbekistan Today» newspaper)

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