Through its $800,000 technical assistance grant, ADB assisted the Government in formulating its comprehensive medium-term strategy for improving living standards in Uzbekistan, which now has formed the basis for the Interim Welfare Improvement Strategy Paper (I-WISP).
ADB continues supporting the Government to move its IWISP into a full Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper together with other development partners.
ADB achieved some important results in various sectors of economy. To name a few, rehabilitation of the Central Asian railway network is bringing fast service to travelers and freight on the Tashkent, Samakand to Bukhara line.
Assistance to water utilities is improving the essential services vital to public health and is expected to benefit 1.1 million people.
ADB is the biggest donor to the country's education sector, providing $260.5 million in loans to the sector since 1997, including projects for textbook development and a textbook rental scheme, policy reform, rural school development, and senior secondary education development.
Regional cooperation and integration is another key area of ADB's work with Uzbekistan. In Central Asia, it promotes regional cooperation through the Central Asian Regional Economic Cooperation (CAREC) program.
The program has concentrated on financing infrastructure projects and improving the region's policy environment in the priority areas of transport, energy, trade policy, and trade facilitation.
ADB is committed to continue its assistance to Uzbekistan in the coming years. In March 2006 ADB approved its new five-year Country Strategy and Program (CSP) of Uzbekistan for 2006-2010.
The new CSP will promote growth that benefits the country's poor while ensuring good governance across the entire program of assistance is maintained.
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