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President Islam Karimov discussed with Michael Grimaldi, Head of Ceneral Motors-DAEWOO and Technology issues related to the development of cooperation between "UzDAEWOOauto" and GMDAT, development and implementation of new joint projects.
During the meeting in Oqsaroy residence, President Islam Karimov expressed hopes that the head of GMDAT will familiarize himself with investment opportunities in our country as he travels in Uzbekistan.
It was in late 2002 when a fundamental contribution was made to the perspective development of an automobile plant in Uzbekistan when a three-year agreement was made with GMDAT that envisioned supplying auto components to "UzDAEWOOauto". In October 2005 the agreement was prolonged until 2010.
Presently, "UzDAEWOOauto" provides the home market with roughly 60 thousand automobiles, and the foreign market - with over 80 thousand automobiles. This year there are plans afoot to load the enterprise at full project capacity which would make 200 thousand automobiles a year.
Within the visit the Uzbek government and GMDAT have signed an agreement on strategic cooperation, which stipulates a further development of automobile production in Uzbekistan and the integration of Uzbekistan with GMDAT global system.
According to Michael Grimaldi, "GMDAT views Uzbekistan as an important market, and the signed agreement on strategic cooperation opens a new stage of cooperation between GMDAT and "Uzautosanoat". And, most importantly, it defines the framework for providing assistance in the acceleration of the growth and development of automobile industry in Uzbekistan and envisions a wider choice of high-quality and competitive automobiles for customers".
In particular, the agreement stipulates a production of current models by DAEWOO such as "Nexia", "Matiz" and "Damas" which will be continued in Asaka, Andijan province. Moreover, "Matiz" and "Nexia" will be modified to make them meet Euro III standards, and will be available both in Uzbekistan and the CIS markets. Also, GMDAT will study the opportunities for the production of new automobiles in Uzbekistan.
The program to ramp up the production of auto components will be a key element in the implementation of strategic partnership, which will raise the level of local automobile assembly up to 70% from the current 54% and thus raise Uzbek automobile production to a new qualitative level. Throughout ten years, around 70 enterprises producing components have been established; among them are over ten joint ventures with foreign partners. Currently, as many as 5 thousand people are employed by the plant and another 40 thousand - by relevant enterprises. The growing level of production localization at "UzDAEWOOauto" and the establishment of close cooperation with suppliers of materials and auto components in different parts of the world as well as strategic partnership with GMDAT will make it possible to significantly boost the effectiveness of production at Asaka and expand its export opportunities.
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Date: May 06, 2007
Source: Uzbekistan today |
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