Talks have started on the launch of a 50 million US dollar tied aid credit programme in which Hungarian companies would modernise street lighting and deliver medical equipment to Uzbekistan, state secretary for foreign affairs and external economic relations Péter Szijjártó said after talks in Tashkent on Thursday.

The state secretary said Hungary wanted closer economic cooperation with Uzbekistan in future. Hungarian exports to Uzbekistan grew 50% in the first half of this year from a year earlier, he added. Talks have started on doubling the number of transport permits Uzbekistan issues to Hungarian haulage companies. An agreement on the matter is important because a Hungarian company will export 5 million euros worth of cattle to Uzbekistan under a farming agreement, Szijjártó added. During the talks, partnership agreements were signed between Hungary’s Eximbank and Uzbekistan’s HamkorBank, between Pest County Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the chamber of the Tashkent region, and between the Hungarian Chamber of Agriculture and the Uzbek farmers’ association.

(MTI)