Central Asia is realizing its potential for interregional connectivity

Central Asia is realizing its potential for interregional connectivity
Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) -- First Deputy Director of ISMI Akramjon Nematov, speaking at the session “The Space of Greater Eurasia: Vectors of Interaction” as part of the 10th anniversary Primakov Readings, stated that the Eurasian space is the natural external environment of Uzbekistan due to economic, geographical and historical factors.
As the expert noted, Uzbekistan is an integral part of the Eurasian space and is fully aware of its responsibility for its sustainable development, well-being and security.
“It is this goal that our efforts in Eurasian associations are subordinated to, where we have recently been pursuing a proactive, proactive foreign policy, especially in the work of such leading integration structures of Eurasia as the CIS, EAEU, SCO,” emphasized Akramjon Nematov.
In this regard, it was noted that over the past seven years, the President of Uzbekistan has put forward about 180 initiatives in the CIS, EAEU and SCO alone. Their essence is constructive multilateral cooperation aimed at launching a new economic dialogue, the purpose of which should be the formation of a common space for increasing intraregional trade and production and technological cooperation.
According to the representative of ISMI, this is especially relevant in the current difficult conditions of the breakdown of the global economic system.
It is noted that the global economy is on the verge of geo-economic fragmentation, and supply chains are being reconfigured. Production is increasingly moving to politically and economically close regions.
“We are facing an unprecedented increase in protectionist measures. The level of global inflation remains high. The situation is complicated by the lack of investment for developing countries,” the expert states.
A. Nematov considers the key to overcoming these trends to be the formation of a single, interconnected and self-sufficient Eurasian space. Based on this, the ISMI expert outlined the main goal of strengthening economic interconnectedness with the countries of Eurasia.
He is convinced that industrial cooperation today should become a key driver of interaction between Eurasian countries. In this context, of no small importance, according to the expert, is the adoption, at the initiative of Uzbekistan in 2022, of the Program for stimulating industrial cooperation between business circles of the SCO countries, as well as in 2023 of the Concept for the development of industrial cooperation in the CIS and the Set of measures for the development of industrial cooperation of the Commonwealth for the period until 2030 of the year.
“Their implementation is aimed at creating new high-tech industries, accelerated development and modernization of industry, increasing production volumes and exports of competitive, innovative and knowledge-intensive products. This will ultimately help strengthen the economic sovereignty of countries,” the analyst emphasized.
According to the expert, the common goal of all Eurasian states to ensure security and progressive economic development is met by building new multi-variant systems of transport corridors at the initiative of Uzbekistan.
Moreover, their versatility is not just an economic requirement of the time, but also an important security factor for all countries of Eurasia. Uzbekistan is actively exploring the issue of building a transport corridor from Central Asia to South Asia through Afghanistan.
In his words, “the project will allow us to enter the rapidly growing two-billion-dollar market of South Asia and thereby form a unified transport framework for Greater Eurasia. There are good prerequisites for this.”
In particular, it was noted that today Central Asia is realizing its potential for transforming the Central Asian space into an important link in interregional interconnectedness and is acting as an industrial and technological hub.
It is emphasized that this is facilitated by the consolidation of the region, established political dialogue and the policy of good neighborliness. The region maintains an atmosphere of mutual trust and mutually beneficial cooperation. “We manage to maintain healthy competition here and avoid geopolitical confrontation,” said the ISMI expert.
It was stated that through joint efforts over the past 7 years it was possible to increase regional GDP by almost 30%. High rates of economic growth are maintained - in the last ten years it has been 6.2% compared to the world average of 2.6%.
This situation contributes to the influx of foreign investment. The total volume of investments compared to 2010 increased 3 times from 100 billion to 300 billion dollars. Moreover, the high dynamics of investment inflow has continued in recent years.
Thus, since 2016, this figure has increased 1.5 times from US$26.9 billion to US$50 billion last year.
Summing up his speech, A. Nematov said that “today Central Asia, which was previously customary to talk about, is becoming truly Central. In essence, the region is a kind of “assembly point” of Greater Eurasia, which stitches together the Eurasian space.”
June 25-26 this year First Deputy Director of ISMI A. Nematov took part in the X International Scientific Expert Forum Primakov Readings. The forum was organized by the E.M. Primakov Institute of World Economy and International Relations of the Russian Academy of Sciences together with the Center for Foreign Policy Cooperation named after. E.M.Primakova, International Trade Center and Russian Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
The event was attended by about 1 thousand leading Russian and foreign experts, representatives of public organizations, politicians and diplomats from 18 countries.
The opening ceremony was attended by Assistant to the President of the Russian Federation Yu. Ushakov, Deputy Chairman of the Federation Council of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation K. Kosachev and Minister of Foreign Affairs of Russia S. Lavrov.

• Uzbekistan
• Central Asia
• Primakov Readings
• Tashkent
• interregional connectivity
• Eurasian space