TASHKENT (TCA) — This year, Uzbekistan plans to increase its grape production up to 1.9 million tons, the Jahon information agency reported.
The area of vineyards has increased by more than 7,000 hectares in all categories of farms over the recent years throughout the country, and grape production has grown by 136,000 tons. This allowed domestic farmers to scale up the production to 1.7 million tons of grapes in 2016.
Large processing enterprises under the Uzvinosanoat (wine industry) Holding have been making certain progress in this direction through the expansion of their own vineyards with valuable industrial grape varieties. To date, they account for more than 4,000 hectares of industrial varieties of vineyards, ensuring a good reserve for strengthening their feedstock base. The company is working on expansion of the vineyards by another 1,400 hectares this year.
The production of bigger volumes of grapes requires strengthening of the logistical capacity of enterprises, and modernization of their facilities. In this context, there are plans to implement 70 projects totaling over 650 billion Uzbek soums in the industry in the next two years.
The projects would increase the volume and improve the quality of products, and introduce international standards. A total of 162 investment projects totaling more than 235 billion soums have been implemented in the production and processing of grapes in Uzbekistan over the past seven years.
