Independence and economic achievements

The economy is the farming and production that provide a country’s people with what they need. In Soviet times Uzbekistan grew cotton and received grain from other republics. When the Union broke up, buying grain became hard. So the task of grain independence was set: cotton areas were reduced and grain was sown, and steps were taken to raise yields. In 2003 grain independence was announced: that year the country grew 5 million 100 thousand tonnes of grain, and harvests grew further in later years. Oil is “black gold”: petrol, kerosene and diesel come from it. Uzbekistan opened a number of fields with foreign partners and by 1995 met its own need for oil products; refineries work in Fergana and Bukhara. Cotton is an old wealth of Uzbekistan: from one tonne of raw cotton about 320–350 kg of fibre is obtained. For a long time much hand labour, including schoolchildren, was used in cotton picking; now the use of children’s labour is forbidden by law and mechanisation is spreading. Modern industry — energy, machine building, chemicals, food and light industry — is the basis of the economy. On 26 March 1996 a car factory in Asaka, built with South Korea’s “Daewoo”, started work; Uzbekistan joined the countries that make cars.