TASHKENT (TCA) — Uzbekistan is selling state shares in the country’s largest chemical and cement plants — Navoiazot (Navoi Nitrogen) and Kyzylkumcement, said Uzbekistan’s State Committee for Privatization, Demonopolization and Competition Development.
Forty-nine percent of shares in Navoiazot are offered for $200.9 million and 35.9 percent of shares in Kyzylkumcement for $160.3 million.
Applications for the open tender are received from March 16.
In May 2015, Uzbekistan President Islam Karimov signed a decree according to which Uzbekistan will sell state assets in industrial enterprises, with preference to be given to foreign investors.
Only strategic foreign investors will be offered state assets, including through the issue of additional shares, in 68 large Uzbek joint stock companies.
Navoiazot is the largest chemical company in Uzbekistan and the leading producer of mineral fertilizer.
In 2015, Navoiazot signed a contract with a consortium of Japanese companies Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Mitsubishi Corporation to build a plant for the production of ammonia and urea on a turnkey basis.
The contract provides for the construction of a facility for the production of 660 thousand tons of ammonia and 577.5 thousand tons of urea per year with the introduction of the world’s leading technology licensors including Haldor Topsoe (Denmark) for ammonia, Saipem (Italy) for the synthesis and urea granulation, and Uhde Fertilizer Technology (Netherlands).
The project will be financed from the Fund for Reconstruction and Development of Uzbekistan and through own funds of Navoiazot. It is also planned to attract credit resources from the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC).
Kyzylkumcement is the country’s largest cement plant, with annual production capacity of 3.08 million tons of cement. In 2014-2016 the plant is implementing a modernization program worth $39.6 million which will increase its production capacity by 8-10 percent.
