13.04.2021

Under the chairmanship of President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, a video conferencing was held on April 13 on the implementation of tasks to ensure employment and meaningful organization of the youth leisure.

The year 2021 was declared as a «Year of Supporting Youth and Protecting the Health of the Population» in our country. At present, the relevant state program is being implemented. The important tasks in this direction were outlined and at the meetings of January 27 and February 10 this year, the specific responsible persons were identified.

Today’s meeting considered the implementation of these tasks, the status of the work with young people carried out by ministers, khokims (governors and mayors) of regions, districts and cities, sector leaders and university rectors.

The country’s «youth book» includes 648 thousand unemployed, 283 thousand of which were employed in the first quarter. In particular, 175 thousand young people were allocated 45 thousand hectares of land.

An additional 36 thousand clubs were organized to organize the leisure activities for young people, to which about 874 thousand boys and girls were involved. Within the Five Important Initiatives, 97 thousand subjects for art and sports equipment, computers and 562 thousand art books were distributed to educational institutions, libraries and training centers.

However, the youth issues are not given sufficient attention in some regions and areas. Thus, in the Andijan Region in the first quarter – only about 5 thousand young people were provided with permanent work. Along with this, at present there are 7 thousand vacancies at industrial enterprises and clusters of the region.

There are also shortcomings in training the unemployed youth for professions and entrepreneurship, providing them with finances. In particular, the program «1+1» has planned to train 100 thousand young people with further provision of preferential loans, but the territorial structures of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry demonstrate the inability to systematically organize this work.

For example, only 21,000 young people across the country received entrepreneurship training in three months. In Tashkent only a one thousand, in the Namangan Region only 1,100 certificates of completion were awarded. In Bukhara Region only 216 young people were trained for professions and entrepreneurship.

In addition, in Surkhandarya Region, only 30% of the unemployed youth are employed. This is the lowest in the country. The project «1+1» covers only 16 people in Khojeyli, 27 – in Furkat, 78 – in Uluggnor, 82 – in Angor Districts.

Such low indicators were sharply criticized at the meeting. For improper organization of the work with youth, the Deputy Khokim of the Surkhandarya Region for the Youth Policy, the khokims of the Furkat and Ulughnor Districts, the leaders of some sectors in the Shafirkan, Kamashi, Khiva, Chust, Khojeyili and Angor Districts will be dismissed. A number of other responsible persons have been issued a strict warning and time has been allocated to rectify the situation.

Measures have been identified to implement the next tasks and expand measures to support the young people.

- The most important task is, first of all, to ensure employment of young people and to create conditions for them to obtain decent income. The entrepreneurship, especially small and medium-sized businesses, is our greatest opportunity and resource in this direction, - said Shavkat Mirziyoyev.

In this regard, the responsible persons are tasked with further expanding measures to support the youth entrepreneurship and the introduction of new employment mechanisms. A number of benefits have been announced for both unemployed and start-up entrepreneurs, as well as for employing organizations.

In particular, from May 1, when enterprises and companies hire young people, they will have back the social tax paid for these employees. In addition, from June 1, the students enlisted in the «youth book» will be able to count on subsidies for 500 thousand Uzbek soums when practicing at enterprises and companies.

The graduates of vocational training centers hired for the first time will be exempted from income tax for up to 6 months.

The entrepreneurs who have employed more than five unemployed from the «youth book» from May 1 will receive a discount of up to 50% when renting a state property.

In addition, the young people renting a building and opening their own business will be reimbursed up to 30% of the annual rent payments.

The expenses of young people from the corresponding « youth book» and pupils of orphanages for driving training and monthly military service will be paid from the budget.

Besides, from June 1 the compensation will be established for part of the expenses of members of the «youth book» for the study of foreign languages and general education subjects at non-state educational institutions.

From July 1, the private enterprises will be provided with subsidies of up to 1 million Uzbek soums for retraining the newly hired workers.

In addition, the amount of the contract paid for the education of young people at vocational and technical schools will be exempted from income tax.

Another important area contributing to the youth employment is agriculture. Today, from 2 thousand to 4,5 thousand young people at 21 districts of the country received land allotments for agriculture.

The President stressed the importance of providing practical assistance to these young people from farmers and clusters before young farmers fulfill agricultural measures and begin to receive income.

It was noted that in support of the those enlisted in the «youth book» it is necessary to allocate subsidies to them in the amount of up to 2 million Uzbek soums for the purchase of seeds and seedlings.

The Ministry of Finance is tasked with creating an electronic platform for transparency in the grant process.

Another challenge is the need to increase the number of qualified middle-level health workers to provide each makhalla and family with quality health services. The medical teams alone require at least 7,000 mid-level workers.

In this regard, as a follow-up to the initiated health reforms, the need to create new jobs for thousands of young people was emphasized by introducing an additional 20 thousand staff of middle-level medical workers and social workers this year.

The issues of meaningful organization of the youth leisure were also discussed at the meeting.

Today, the children’s centers «Barkamol avlod» cover only 175 thousand children. The aim is to take full advantage of the potential of these institutions, increase coverage by establishing their branches in each school.

Consistently, the work will continue on attracting young people to sports, culture and art, holding various festivals and competitions, and preparing for prestigious international competitions.

The President stressed that each university should be a center of spirituality and culture for the nearest makhallas (the local neighborhood community areas), in which the participation of rectors is completely not felt.

The issue of housing conditions of students was separately considered.

Today, more than 130 thousand students rent housing. The government was preparing a special program  on the subject. According to it, from May 1 half of the rent will be provided for students. Initially, the system will reach 60 thousand young people. At the same time, the low-income students will be reimbursed from the funds of khokimiyats and universities.

On the issues discussed at the meeting, the reports of those responsible officials were heard.