page_title: Economy of Uzbekistan
section_title: GDP and employment
hierarchical_section_title: Economy of Uzbekistan / GDP and employment
caption_attribution_description: Uzbekistan GDP growth 1992-2008
context_page_description: Since independence, the economy of Uzbekistan continues to exist as a Soviet-style command economy with slow transformation to market economy. The progress of governmental economic policy reforms has been cautious, but cumulatively Uzbekistan has shown respectable achievements. Its restrictive trade regime and generally interventionist policies continue to have a negative effect on the economy. Substantial structural reform is needed, particularly in these areas: improving the investment climate for foreign investors, strengthening the banking system, and freeing the agricultural sector from state control. Remaining restrictions on currency conversion capacity and other government measures to control economic activity, including the implementation of severe import restrictions and sporadic closures of Uzbekistan's borders with neighboring Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan have led international lending organizations to suspend or scale back credits.
  Working closely with the IMF, the government has made considerable progress in reducing inflation and the budget deficit.
context_section_description: This is a chart depicting the trend of the gross domestic product in Uzbekistan in constant prices of 1995, estimated by the International Monetary Fund with figures in millions of som. The chart also shows the consumer price index(CPI) as a measure of inflation from the same source and the end-of-year U.S. dollar exchange rate from the Central Bank of the Uzbekistan database. For purchasing power parity comparisons in 2006, the U.S. dollar is exchanged at 340 som.
  Uzbekistan's GDP, like that of all CIS countries, declined during the first years of transition and then recovered after 1995, as the cumulative effect of policy reforms began to be felt. It has shown robust growth, rising by 4% per year between 1998 and 2003, and accelerating thereafter to 7%-8% per year. In 2011 the growth rate came up to 9%.
  Given the growing economy, the total number of people employed rose from 8.5 million in 1995 to 13.5 million in 2011. This healthy increase of nearly 25% in the labor force lagged behind the increase in GDP during the same period (64%, see chart), which implies a significant increase in labor productivity. Official unemployment is very low: less than 30,000 job seekers were registered in government labor exchanges in 2005-2006 (0.3% of the labor force). Underemployment, on the other hand, is believed to be quite high, especially in agriculture, which accounts for fully 28% of all employed, many of them working part-time on tiny household plots. However, no reliable figures are available due to the absence of credible labor surveys.
  The minimum wage, public-sector wages, and old-age pensions are routinely raised twice a year to ensure that base income is not eroded by inflation. Although no statistics are published on average wages in Uzbekistan, pensions as a proxy for the average wage increased significantly between 1995 and 2006, both in real terms and in U.S. dollars. The monthly old-age pension increased in real (CPI-adjusted) sums by almost a factor of 5 between 1995 and 2006. The monthly pension in U.S. dollars was around $20–$25 until 2000, then dropped to $15–$20 between 2001 and 2004, and now is $64. The minimum wage was raised to $34.31 in November 2011. Assuming that the average wages in the country are at a level of 3-4 times the monthly pension, we estimate the wages in 2006 at $100–$250 per month, or $3–$8 per day.
  According to the forecast by the Asian Development Bank, the GDP in Uzbekistan in 2009 is expected to grow by 7%. Meanwhile, in 2010 the Uzbekistan GDP growth is predicted at 6,5%.
caption: Uzbekistan: Growth of GDP in constant prices 1992–2008.[20]
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