22.02.2023

On February 22, President Shavkat Mirziyoyev chaired a videoconference on acceleration of the digitalization processes in the regions and regions.

The great attention paid to the field of information technology in recent years is yielding results. Last year the IT Park residents rendered services worth 5 trillion Uzbek sum and exported services for $140 million.

370 out of 715 public services have been digitized, and 12 million people have used electronic services last year. As a result of digitalization, more than 70 types of certificates and documents were no longer required from the population.

However, it was noted at the meeting that taken measures are not enough. And much work remains to be done in the spheres and regions. Particularly, only 30 percent of 5 thousand functions of the ministries have been digitized. The dozens of services in the internal affairs, justice, standardization and health care, which are in a high demand among the population, have not been digitized.

The main part of the IT production and export falls on the city of Tashkent. The construction of IT parks in Karakalpakstan, Bukhara, Namangan, Surkhandarya, Navoi and Tashkent regions is still under way.

The shortcomings in the field were analyzed and identified the tasks for the future.

It was noted that in the future the export of the IT services in our country should reach $1 billion. This requires at least 100 thousand qualified programmers, IT-architects, operators and engineers. It is necessary to expand the high-speed Internet network in the regions and create a more favorable environment for the presence of foreign IT companies. New electronic services in the high demand among citizens and entrepreneurs need to be introduced.

The President listed growth opportunities in the area.

First of all, it has been determined that the projects tested in Tashkent will be implemented in all regions. In particular, such systems as Digital Geoportal, Digital Portal of Housing and Communal Services and People’s Control System have been launched in the capital. There is a Digital Development Department in the khokimiyat of the city. It has been determined that this structure will be transferred to the Ministry of Digital Technology to operate the digitalization process in all regions of the country.

Particular attention is paid to full digitalization and integration of all business processes and essential services for the population.

For example, due to the lack of a unified student database, the number of classes in schools varied. Last September, the harmonization of the databases of schools, kindergartens, registries and internal affairs bodies resulted in the optimization of 4,000 unnecessarily created classes, which saved 350 billion Uzbek sum.

The President noted that the similar work can be done in other spheres as well. The Ministry of Economy and Finance has been instructed to allocate funds for this purpose, as well as to leave to the ministries and khokimiyat half of the savings from digitalization.

The Ministry of Digital Technology has been tasked to connect 26 information systems to the Single Portal of State Services and increase the number of services in it to 570.

“What is the goal of digitalization? To make people happy, to ensure human dignity and justice,” Shavkat Mirziyoyev said.

The President stressed the need to train young people in information technologies, create conditions for work in this sphere and create a market for products developed by them.

On April 1, the republican competition with a prize fund of $1 million dollars in the areas “E-Government”, “Business Programs”, education will start. Also, the 50 best programs created by young people in the regions will be purchased from the funds of digitization funds.

Over the past two years, 215 IT training centres have been opened in our country. Financial incentives have been announced for such educational institutions and their graduates. In particular, a subsidy of up to 25 million Uzbek soums will be allocated to training centers for each graduate who employed in a company exporting their products, and for each such specialist with disabilities - up to 35 million Uzbek soums. Young people with IT certificate will be able to get a preferential loan for purchasing a computer on their personal plastic cards.

The project “One Million Uzbek Coders” has also paid off. Currently, most IT park specialists are young people who have completed this program.

Youth education will be expanded, including through the Coursera platform. The most talented, qualified, will be trained for the international IT market on the basis of a separate program.

The issue of increasing exports in the industry was also discussed at the meeting. The goal for this year is to reach $300 million.

Our President stressed the need to create additional conditions for attracting orders from abroad. In this regard, a task has been set to create a Digital Financial Technology Center for foreign companies in the IT park.

Information and proposals from executives have been heard on the issues discussed at the meeting.