Tajik entrepreneurs are not in a hurry to apply for export loans provided by Uzbekistan.
Recall, Amonatbonk (Tajikistan’s savings bank) and Uzbekistan’s National Bank for Foreign Economic Activity signed an agreement on trade financing in late July last year. Under this agreement, Uzbekistan provides loans to Tajik enterprises working in both countries.
Uzbekistan is expected to provide 43 million U.S. dollars through Amonatbonk to Tajik enterprises for import of Uzbek goods.
Meanwhile, in a report released at a news conference in Dushanbe, Amonatbonk top manager Sirojiddin Ikromi revealed on February 5 that to-date, only 507,000 USD have been provided to Tajik entrepreneurs in export loans through Amonatbonk.
According to him, Tajik entrepreneurs are not in a hurry to apply for Uzbek export loans because they are provided in dollars.
“There has been a tendency for devaluation of the Tajik national currency, the somoni, in recent years. Therefore, our citizens prefer to receive loans in the national currency,” Ikromi said.
Amonatbonk head also attributes unwillingness of Tajik entrepreneurs to apply for Uzbek export loans to the fact that under conditions set by the Uzbek side not money but goods are given.
Amonatbonk, Orienbonk and Eskhata Bank singed cooperation agreements with Uzbekistan’s National Bank for Foreign Economic Activity and Asaka Bank in March last year.
Under these agreements, Uzbekistan will extend US$100 million worth of credit to develop enterprises working in both countries. The loan will be provided to Tajikistan for import of Uzbek goods.
The documents provide for launching special credit lines at the mentioned Tajik banks for implementation of the trade financing projects for the purpose of increasing the export of Uzbekistan’s goods and services (textiles, building materials, food products, household chemical goods, farm produce, electrical equipment, vehicles, etc.) to Tajikistan.
Low-interest loans will be provided to entrepreneurs who have specific business-plans on expansion of cooperation with Uzbek state-run and private companies.
Tajik enterprises wanting to deliver Uzbek goods to the country reportedly can receive up to 1 million U.S. dollars in preferential loans,
It is to be noted that Uzbekistan signed a similar agreement with Kyrgyzstan during Kyrgyz President Sooronbai Jeenbekov’s visit to Tashkent in December 2017.
A separate agreement was concluded in early February last year between Uzbekistan’s Uzpromstroybank and Asaka Bank and Kyrgyzstan’s RSK Bank and Aiyl Bank on conditions for provision of this money.
The first contract worth US$600,000 on delivery of Uzbek agricultural machines to Kyrgyzstan was signed in the Kyrgyz capital, Bishkek, in mid-February last year.
