“No single kg of cotton will be sold abroad in 2020” – Shavkat Mirziyoyev 

 On December 20, 2018, President Shavkat Mirziyoyev chaired a video conference meeting on the full implementation of the new tax policy concept into practice.  
 
“With great difficulties, we attracted foreign experts and adopted the concept of taxation. Now we have to introduce this concept into practice. However, there may appear problems while implementing it. I'm worried that not everyone can understand this concept properly. Therefore, we have discussed it several times. This process has been going on for more than 6 months," Shavkat Mirziyoyev stressed. 
 
At the meeting, the president declared that there is set commitment to export things worth $ 19 billion for 2019. 
 
For information, the volume of Uzbek exports in 2016 amounted to $ 11.1 billion and in 2017 - $ 13.9 billion. It is forecasted that the volume of exports by the end of 2018 will be around $ 13 billion. 
 
In addition, the president once again emphasized that Uzbekistan would stop selling raw cotton to foreign countries by 2020. 
 
“The textile industry should export goods worth $ 1.9 billion next year. By 2020, we will not sell a ton or a kilo of cotton. We process it by ourselves. This is an added value,” the president said addressing the head of the Association “Uztukimachiliksanoat” Ilkhom Haydarov. 
 
The export volume of “Uztukimachiliksanoat” in 2018 amounted to $ 1.5 billion.  
 
“The additional value means extra earnings. The State Budget will be remitted more than 9.1 trillion sums. Of these, 5 trillion sums will remain for the local budget,” he added. 
 
It should be noted that the president had earlier said that it was necessary to stop the sale of raw cotton abroad. During his visit to Kashkadarya region this month, he pointed out as an example that Bangladesh does not engage in cotton cultivation, however, it purchases raw cotton from other countries for processing and exports products made of cotton worth $ 37 billion annually.