Opening up Uzbekistan: Part 2

Business Daily

BBC

News, Business

4.4 • 796 Ratings

🗓️ 7 March 2023

⏱️ 18 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

BBC journalist Rayhan Demytrie is from Uzbekistan and was recently invited back to her country to explore how after almost 30 years the government is opening up the country and it's economy.

In part two of this two part Business Daily special Rayhan hears how young entrepreneurs are pushing to grow their businesses and increase exports. Rayhan also finds out how digital only banking companies are transforming access to financial services for many Uzbek people.

In the capital city of Uzbekistan, Tashkent, Rayhan explores how the city has developed and changed in recent years and finds out more about the corruption that continues to cause problems for businesses.

Presenter / producer: Rayhan Demytrie Image: Tashkent bazaar; Credit: Getty Images

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi, Namulantakombo here with some exciting news.
0:04.2	My award-winning podcast, Dear Daughter, is back for a second season.
0:09.0	We're bringing you more moving personal stories and more letters of advice from people all around the world.
0:15.4	For Daughters everywhere.
0:17.7	That's Dear Daughter from the BBC World Service. Find it wherever you get your BBC podcasts.
0:28.3	Hello and welcome to part two of Business Daily special from Uzbekistan. I'm Rehan
0:37.4	Dimitri and I was born there.
0:39.7	Central Asia's most populous country has largely been closed to the outside world for almost 30 years.
0:47.6	You're welcome, you're welcome. You're showing for all the world over culture.
0:52.6	Now I'm returning as a journalist to see how my country is changing.
0:58.1	We were the first digital bank in Uzbekistan.
1:01.1	Our growth is really significant.
1:03.9	So we achieved three times more that we expected.
1:09.8	In part one, we talked about the market reforms in Uzbekistan, privatization of state assets and the energy crisis this winter that has exposed how weak the country's state-owned infrastructure had become.
1:26.9	In part two, we take a look at the opportunities for reaching a youthful consumer market.
1:33.6	Young people under 30 years old constitute 60% of the country's population of 35 million.
1:40.7	To be honest, everyone asked this question and they wonder why I came back from
1:44.7	England to Uzbekistan and I graduated from Manchester Business School. But I believe that we
1:50.2	have more opportunities to grow faster in this kind of markets than in England, for example.
1:57.9	And what is being done to address corruption in a country where criticizing the president can get you to jail?
2:05.7	All of this coming up in Business Daily on the BBC World Service.
2:15.6	At Uzbekistan's annual economic forum in Samarkand,
	...

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