Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) — Uzbekistan has approved a procedure for providing incentive subsidies to tour operators who attract tourists from countries with low tourism traffic. This decision aims to stimulate the development of tourism and diversify tourism routes.

Subsidies will be provided to legal entities engaged in tourism activities in Uzbekistan from 1 January 2024 to 31 December 2026. The selection of tour operators will be conducted through a competitive process by the Tourism Committee under the Ministry of Ecology, Environmental Protection, and Climate Change. The list of countries with low tourism traffic will be approved by the commission at the end of each year.

The amount of the incentive subsidy for each tourist from low-traffic countries will be determined by the commission.

The commission’s decision will be valid with the participation of at least two-thirds of its members (the decision is made by a majority vote, and in case of a tie, the chairperson has the deciding vote).

The working body of the commission is the Committee.

The commission will make decisions on concluding contracts with selected tour operators based on the competition results.

The working body of the commission prepares meeting minutes and decisions, organizes the participation of applicants in competitive sessions, and their presentations.

The Committee will post information about the competition on its official website, as well as on social media platforms "Telegram" and "Facebook" and in mass media.

REQUIREMENTS FOR CANDIDATES TO RECEIVE THE INCENTIVE SUBSIDY:

Sufficient experience working in the tourism sector as a tour operator.

Effectiveness of previously implemented projects and programs by the tour operator.

Presence of a marketing strategy and PR campaign plan to attract tourists to the Republic of Uzbekistan from the selected country.

Financial stability and transparency of the tour operator’s activities.

Presentation of the project by the tour operator at the commission session.

To participate in the competition, tour operators must submit an application to the email address subsidiyalari@uzbektourism.uz with the required information. Documents from applicants will be accepted within one month after the competition announcement is published in the media.

Documents submitted after the deadline will not be considered. Within twenty days after the submission deadline, the documents of the participants will be reviewed, and winners will be determined.

THE COMPETITION WILL BE HELD IN TWO STAGES:

In the first stage, the projects submitted by tour operators will be reviewed and selected within ten days after the document submission deadline.

In the second stage, selected tour operators will present their projects to the commission, which will evaluate the presentations and make a decision within ten days.

The decision on selecting tour operators will be formalized in the minutes. If the commission cannot select the most suitable tour operator according to the goals and criteria of the competition, a new competition will be announced.

Contracts for the provision of incentive subsidies will be concluded with the selected tour operators, specifying the terms of subsidy allocation.

The incentive subsidy will generally be allocated based on the results of the first half of the reporting year or the reporting month.

The Ministry of Economy and Finance will review the request submitted by the Committee within three working days and transfer the corresponding funds to the Committee’s treasury accounts.

After the transfer of funds, the Committee will transfer them to the commercial bank accounts of the entrepreneurs within three working days.