Monday, May 28, 2012 -
Uzbek authorities said Friday they will spend $390 million this year on completing one-quarter of a national highway network throughout the desert nation.
Senior officials of the finance ministry’s National Road Fund told reporters in the capital Tashkent they envisage a system of new roads that meet international standards and integrate into regional highway corridors.
Project planners aim to construct or reconstruct 1,400 miles of road with seven road junctions, flyovers, and bridges, they said.
Around one-quarter of the project will be completed in 2012.
“This year envisages building and reconstructing 517 km [321 miles] of roads with four lanes that meet international requirements,” the independent Uznews.net news agency cited deputy director of the National Road Fund, Alisher Hakberdiyev, as telling the news conference.
Some $390 million will be invested into the project in 2012 with around $300 million coming from Uzbek state authorities and the remainder from international financial institutions.
The National Road Fund will allocate $230 million and the Uzbek Reconstruction and Development Fund will invest $68.3 million dollars into the project. International lenders will allot $90.7 million in 2012.
“The country is actively attracting foreign investment” to make it possible “to renew infrastructure and buy machine-building equipment and vehicles” at the first stage, said Hakberdiyev.
He said Uzbekistan has already signed deals with construction companies from China, South Korea, and Germany.
The project was adopted in December 2010 under a 2011-2015 program for the development of infrastructure, transport, and communications.