Listen to the article
President Shavkat Mirziyoyev visited the Chim mahalla in Qamashi district, Kashkadarya region, on Wednesday to review infrastructure projects completed under a programme to develop the settlement as a showcase of what officials are calling a “New Uzbekistan-style neighbourhood.”
Chim is home to more than 5,500 residents, roughly half of them young people. The state has directed 55 billion soums into upgrading the area’s infrastructure, funding a 640-seat school, a 240-place kindergarten, a mahalla centre, a youth centre, a public park and 4.5 kilometres of new road. Electricity supply and irrigation networks have also been renewed.
Mirziyoyev stopped at a playground in the mahalla centre to speak with children and their mothers, then visited the youth library, where he asked young readers about their ambitions and interests.
Language Day remarks
The visit coincided with Uzbek Language Day, and the president used his conversation with young residents to reflect on the occasion. He recalled the work of poets Abdulla Oripov, Erkin Vohidov and Halima Xudoyberdiyeva, and said respect for the national language and literary heritage was growing.
“Today, respect for our language, our nation and our identity is rising steadily,” Mirziyoyev said. “People are turning back to books. We are restoring the spiritual heritage left by our ancestors. That kind of spiritual environment and those conditions are being created here in Chim as well.”
Higher education enrolment
The president also addressed the expansion of university access, framing it as central to the country’s future. “Where previously only 9 out of every 100 young people studied in higher education, today 45 do,” he said. “Establishing universities and creating conditions for faculty requires enormous effort. But Uzbekistan’s future needs personnel with national pride and love for the homeland. I believe in you. The future of our beloved country and of the Kashkadarya region is in your hands.”
Jobs and agriculture
Beyond physical infrastructure, the visit highlighted employment measures. A carpet-weaving and embroidery enterprise employing women has received 3.5 billion soums in investment. With bank support, around 20 households have set up greenhouses covering a combined 36 sotikh, and a 200-tonne cold-storage facility has been built to handle produce. The measures have brought more than 80 previously unemployed residents into work, according to official figures.
Lemon cultivation is also being developed on a cooperative basis, with seedlings, fertiliser and agronomical services supplied to participating households and a guaranteed purchase price for the harvest. The president was told that by intercropping potatoes, broccoli and greens between lemon trees during the years before the trees bear fruit, each greenhouse can generate an additional 14 to 16 million soums in income annually.