Uzbekistan Quality Job Creation as a Cornerstone for Sustainable Economic Growth

Figure 1.12: Economic Complexity and GDP per Capita,
Various Countries, 2017

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Uzbekistan Quality Job Creation as a Cornerstone for Sustainable Economic Growth
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1.4.2. External position
The current account of Uzbekistan’s balance of payments has been in surplus 
since 2002. High GDP growth coupled with fiscal and current account 
surpluses during this period led to low ratios of external debt to GDP, which 
were below 20% during 2010–2016. In 2017, this increased to 29.9% of GDP as 
the currency depreciated and the economy slowed. Foreign direct investment 
inflows have been significant and were mainly into oil and gas, petrochemicals, 
and automobile manufacturing. They have declined, however, from a peak in 
2010 partly due to the lumpy nature of the investments and partly due to the 
uncertainty in the global energy market arising from falling commodity prices 
(Table 1.2).
8
8
The 2011 peak in foreign direct investment was due to new cooperation arrangements with the People’s 
Republic of China that gained momentum with the launch of a construction project to build a pipeline 
extension linking Uzbekistan to the Central Asia–China gas pipeline
ECI = Economic Complexity Index, RRDC = resource-rich developing country; RRC = resource-rich 
country.
Source: Compiled from the Atlas of Economic Complexity Data. http://atlas.cid.harvard.edu/about-data 
(accessed 11 November 2019). 
Figure 1.13: Economic Complexity Index Values, Uzbekistan and 
Other Resource-Rich Countries, 1995–2017
ECI Value
Uzbekistan
RRDC average
Average of other RRDCs
–1.4
–1.2
–1.0
–0.8
–0.6
–0.4
–0.2
0.0
0.2
1995
1998
2001
2004
2007
2010
2013
2016