BAKU, Azerbaijan, December 7. Mastercard plans to launch an e-Commerce School in Uzbekistan jointly with the Ministry of Investment, Industry and Trade of the Republic of Uzbekistan, Mastercard’s Country Manager in Uzbekistan and Belarus Denis Filippov told Trend.
The country manager emphasized that the e-Commerce School's training will be available to both managers and staff in the tourism sector, including those from small firms.
"We can see how actively the tourism industry in Uzbekistan has developed in recent years. From January through August of this year, 4.3 million tourists from various nations visited the country, contributing an additional $1.4 billion to the Uzbek economy. The number of foreign tourists has climbed three to fourfold. According to Mastercard research, a sense of financial security is important for people traveling to other countries because they want to know that their card will be accepted anywhere," Filippov said.
Therefore, the company representative stressed that Mastercard strives to ensure universal acceptance of its cards and that they are already accepted in Uzbekistan almost everywhere, including cities of attraction for tourism like Tashkent, Samarkand and Bukhara.
"Our Mastercard Tourism Insights platform will also help the country's international tourism development. It is based on an investigation of how our clients use maps in other countries, and it allows us to predict tourist behavior and consumer preferences, allowing us to better organize tourist flows," he said.
Filippov also stated that in October 2023, Mastercard and Uzbekistan's Ministry of Ecology, Environmental Protection, and Climate Change signed a Memorandum announcing the start of joint work between Uzbekistan and the Mastercard Center for Tourism Innovation, and the first working meeting with the Ministry was already held in November.
Aziz Abdukhakimov, Uzbekistan's Minister of Ecology, Environmental Protection, and Climate Change, and Nikola Villa, Mastercard's Global Head of the Public Sector and Executive Vice President for Strategic Development, signed a Memorandum of Understanding in the field of tourism development earlier this year.
According to the inked memorandum, Uzbekistan's Ministry of Ecology, Environmental Protection, and Climate Change will join the Mastercard Tourism Innovation Hub.
The Mastercard Tourism Innovation Hub will collaborate with Uzbekistan's Ministry and subordinate entities to create joint digital solutions for the government, domestic and foreign tourists, and tourism businesses.
