_BIOGRAPHY Sherzod Khidoyatov, Minister of Construction and Housing and Communal Services, was born in Tashkent in 1980. A graduate of Tashkent State Technical University, he led construction at the Akfa Group, then directed the Tashkent City project before becoming First Deputy Minister in 2019.

“A CONSTRUCTION PERMIT TOOK 246 DAYS IN 2019. BY 2025 THE FIGURE HAD FALLEN TO 72 DAYS, AND IN 2026 IT STANDS AT 37.”

IN 2025 UZBEKISTAN DELIVERED 8.1 MILLION SQUARE METERS OF MULTI-STOREY HOUSING. WHAT DOES THIS SIGNAL TO INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPERS?

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The starting point is demography. National statistics put Uzbekistan’s permanent population at 38,236,704 as of 1 January 2026, growing at 1.7 percent a year and projected to reach 49.5 million by 2040. Fourteen regions already form fast-developing agglomerations that will hold between 50 and 70 percent of the population over the coming decade, and that single fact rewrites planning logic at every level of government. Housing stock must nearly double in fifteen years, from 707 million to 1.1 billion square meters.

Annual construction will rise from 16.8 to 30.3 million square meters, with multi-storey buildings taking more than half the total. New rental housing brings workers and students close to where they study and work, and lower-income residents into neighborhoods that were previously out of reach. Three measures hold this volume in place. Master plans now reserve land long before construction begins.

The New Uzbekistan complex-development zones are built as integrated systems rather than parcel by parcel, and permit timelines keep falling. The 8.1 million square meters delivered in 2025 lifts the cumulative total to 210 million square meters of residential and non-residential space since reforms began. For 2026 the target is 140,000 new apartments in multi-storey housing and a 30 billion dollar construction volume, run through escrow accounts so buyer funds reach certified developers via banks rather than the contractor’s own cashflow.

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For foreign builders and institutional real estate investors, the read is straightforward. Demand is steady. Rules are explicit. The horizon is set out twenty years ahead. Density in the agglomerations cuts infrastructure cost and shortens commute times, both of which feed directly into land value and rental yield.

NEW TASHKENT WILL HOST TWO MILLION RESIDENTS BY 2045. WHAT DOES THIS MEAN FOR INVESTORS?

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New Tashkent occupies 19,700 hectares between the Chirchik and Karasu rivers. The first phase covers 6,000 hectares and 100 districts designed for 600,000 residents, with New Uzbekistan University, the National Library, Nizami University, housing for 60,000 people, more than thirty schools, more than twenty kindergartens and five family clinics. Two hundred thousand jobs come with it.

Ministries and republican-level agencies are relocating from central Tashkent. Their existing buildings will be auctioned through open tender, and the proceeds will fund the new administrative complexes. A 420-hectare Central Park sits between the two rivers with lakes, fountains, theatres and concert halls. The whole city is built on the 15-minute principle, which means that work, school, clinic and shop sit within a quarter-hour walk of every residential block. Four towers will set the skyline. Tashkent Tower at 509 meters becomes the tallest building in Central Asia and the tenth tallest in the world. Central Park Tower reaches 475 meters, Tashkent International Finance Center 450 meters and Tashkent Plaza 425 meters.

Two metro lines connect to the existing network through Buyuk Ipak Yuli and Dustlik stations, putting New Tashkent within thirty to thirty-five minutes of the city center, and a high-speed rail line takes passengers to the airport in fifteen. Energy supply is fully integrated. Four solar plants in Qibray, Yukorichirchik, Ohangaron and Buka districts will deliver a combined 2,400 megawatts. Once online, they will generate 6 billion kilowatt hours a year, enough for two million additional residents and 30,000 enterprises. Foreign investment in these projects has already passed 2 billion dollars.

PERMIT PROCESSES HAVE MOVED FULLY ONLINE. HOW IS DIGITALISATION CHANGING THE SPEED OF CONSTRUCTION APPROVALS?

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Every stage from design documentation to commissioning now runs through the Transparent Construction (Shaffof Qurilish) platform, which is integrated with the information systems of 24 ministries and exposes every decision in the chain to a public audit trail. Applications that fail to meet the technical requirements are rejected automatically, with no human in the loop to overturn the rules. The numbers tell the story directly.

A construction permit took 246 days in 2019. By 2025 the figure had fallen to 72 days, and in 2026 it stands at 37. The geo-information portal at dshk.shaffofqurilish.uz lets any applicant check whether a project complies with the master plan before paperwork is even submitted, which removes the longest source of delay in any land-use process. For foreign companies, this is a real shift. Site selection can be tested against the plan in an afternoon. Feasibility analysis runs against confirmed parameters rather than assumptions about what the local office will eventually approve. Approval timelines can be forecast with precision. The discipline cuts both ways. Investors gain predictability and a record of decisions they can show their boards. The state gains a register of land use that makes the next master plan considerably easier to draft.

PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS NOW ACCOUNT FOR 28 BILLION DOLLARS OF ACTIVITY. WHERE ARE THE NEXT OPENINGS?

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Four directions stand out over the next three years. The first is heat supply and utilities modernisation, where the thirty-year Tashkent concession with Veolia is the working precedent and the model that other cities are now studying carefully. Water and sewerage networks come second, with regional capitals lining up behind Tashkent for similar concession structures. Housing and complex-development projects come third, supported by the same escrow architecture used in commercial residential build, which gives international lenders a familiar set of safeguards.

Transport infrastructure management closes the list. It covers toll roads and metro extensions in cities that are growing faster than their road networks, alongside parking systems in the central districts. The 28 billion dollar pipeline already in motion is not the ceiling. It is the proof that the framework holds. The construction sector is forecast to grow 11 percent in 2026, adding a further 5 billion dollars to the market. For investors the implication is plain. Operations and concession revenue sit alongside the build itself, and the holding period stretches into decades rather than ending at handover. The capital that performs best in Uzbekistan is the capital that plans to stay.

YOUR MESSAGE TO INVESTORS INTERESTED TO PARTICIPATE IN THE ECONOMIC GROWTH OF UZBEKISTAN?

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Uzbekistan has moved into a different phase. Investors are no longer in the country only to put up a building and walk away once the keys are handed over. They can hold long-term operating positions and earn from service and concession revenue across decades, with a regulatory base that is now written down and enforced through the same digital systems that approve their permits.

Public-private projects sit on a clear legal footing and a stable revenue model, and digitalisation reinforces every part of that system from application to handover. The market is growing fast and the rules are written down. The management is competent, and the time horizon suits patient capital that wants to be in a frontier economy before the rest of the institutional world arrives. We have the demographic data to back the demand curve and the master plans to back the supply curve, with the digital infrastructure on top to keep both honest. To the 165,000-member investor network reading this edition of The Investor, the message is direct. Come and see for yourselves. The numbers and the timelines are on the table.