On 17 May in Xi'an, the ancient capital of the People's Republic of China, an Uzbek-Chinese business forum was held on the eve of the official visit of President Sahvkat Mirziyoyev to the People's Republic of China. Apart from existing long- term partners, over 400 major Chinese companies interested in establishing cooperation with Uzbekistan participated during the forum.

Minister of Investments, Industry and Trade Laziz Kudratov, addressing the Forum participants with a congratulatory speech, highly appreciated the firm attitude of the entrepreneurs to establish mutually beneficial partnership relations.

The rate of trade-economic and investments relations between two countries have been growing steadily.  At the end of 2022, trade turnover grew by 20% and reached a record 9 billion USD. At the same time, country leaders have set a concrete goal to bring this figure to 10 billion dollars this year, which can be achieved by joint efforts and coordinated actions.

There has also been steady growth in the investment sector. The total volume of Chinese investment since 2017 has increased fivefold to 11 billion USD. In 2022 alone, Chinese investment of 2.2 billion USD was absorbed. The number of joint ventures in Uzbekistan has tripled in the last 5 years.

Representatives of the Chinese business community were given a detailed briefing on the positive structural changes and the comfortable conditions for doing business in Uzbekistan. The Forum also featured presentations of specific project proposals and initiatives for joint implementation, covering dozens of different areas and directions. The Forum participants were able to discuss the forthcoming cooperation in more detail during the "B2B" and "G2B" talks.

The event resulted in the signing of 20 bilateral documents in the fields of energy chemicals, metallurgy, light industry, geology, transportation, agriculture, education, science, digital technologies, automotive industry, electrical engineering, pharmaceuticals, tourism and other areas.