Uzbekistan, Tashkent, Oct. 22 / Trend , D.Azizov /
Over 3.5 million tons of raw cotton was harvested in Uzbekistan.
Uzbek President Islam Karimov congratulated the country's farmers with fulfilling their contracts with the state.
"It is a great pleasure to congratulate farmers and all works of industry for fulfilling contractual obligations and delivering over 3.5 million tons of high quality raw cotton," Karimov's congratulatory message reads.
The message reads that the progress also had been achieved in the cotton industry thanks to practical work aimed at improving soil fertility.
Uzbekistan invested over 539.5 billion soums to land-reclamation works in last four years, which helped to achieve this result.
He said over 90 percent of the harvest is cotton of the highest grade thanks to the conduct of a high level of farming activities, from planning and plowing land harvesting to procuring qualitative seeds, water management and processing of cotton.
Based on the preliminary calculations, gross income is expected to exceed 2.4 trillion soums, which is 25 percent more than in 2010, Karimov said.
"This will undoubtedly create huge opportunities for further improvement of the Uzbek villages and the whole country, construction of new schools, lyceums and colleges, modern medical establishments, children's sports objects, social infrastructure and rural housing, or, in short, for the further growth of the prosperity of Uzbekistan and its people," Karimov noted.
Karimov said the world market shows increased demand in the Uzbek cotton. "The fact that the recent International Uzbek Cotton and Textile Fair resulted in contracts for sale of 650,000 tons of Uzbek cotton fiber with large foreign companies can be evidence to this," he said.
Uzbekistan modernized over 200 textile enterprises and created new joint ventures with foreign partners to increase internal processing and export ready products with value added cost, he said.
"If in 1990s the country processed only 7 percent of cotton-fiber and now it processes over 33 percent."
"Our efforts to increase this figure in the near future will undoubtedly serve to the sustainable development of the economy, creating thousands of new jobs further increasing earnings," he said.