[{"bbox": [71, 119, 1158, 255], "category": "Text", "text": "particular as related to the development of fair, healthy and environmentally-friendly food systems (\"EU Farm to Fork Strategy²\" and the European Green Deal³), support to family farming, food safety and integration into the global markets.\nThe Action will target primarily SDG 2 Enhance food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture, and SDG 8 Promote sustainable and inclusive economic growth through increased productive employment and decent work for men and women. It also intends to contribute to SDGs 1, 3, 5, 10, 12, 13, and 15."}, {"bbox": [71, 260, 1158, 417], "category": "Text", "text": "The proposed outcomes are also aligned with the TEI in Uzbekistan entitled “*Support to a modern and sustainable agri-food sector and resilient rural livelihoods*”, which aims to facilitate inclusive, green, sustainable, gender responsive and climate-smart development of agri-food sector, and recovery of the Aral Sea region through blending operations, technical assistance (TA), budget support and policy dialogue. In addition to the EU, indicative contributions to the TEI are: France (AFD) - EUR 217 million, Germany (GIZ and KfW) - EUR 9 million, Latvia – EUR 0.2 million, EIB – EUR 100 million and EBRD – EUR 125.5 million."}, {"bbox": [71, 444, 301, 475], "category": "Section-header", "text": "# 2. RATIONALE"}, {"bbox": [71, 498, 198, 524], "category": "Section-header", "text": "## 2.1 Context"}, {"bbox": [83, 542, 1178, 781], "category": "Text", "text": "The agriculture sector accounts for 26% of GDP and is therefore a major contributor not only to economic growth and export revenues but, crucially, to job creation and the fight against inequalities, playing an important role in the country's green recovery from the COVID-19 crisis. Uzbekistan has been relatively successful to date in developing medium and small scale manufacturing based on textiles and agricultural value chains. Increases in domestic income and investment, as well as anti-crisis spending and tax relief measures have also contributed to relatively strong growth in 2021. However, with the consequences of Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine, Uzbekistan's growth is set to decline in 2022 due to a slowdown of remittances, the return of labour migrants, uncertain trade and investment flows from Russia as the biggest trade partner of Uzbekistan, currency devaluation and increased inflation, reducing the purchasing power of the population."}, {"bbox": [83, 806, 1178, 1099], "category": "Text", "text": "While the Government's commitment to continuing reforms is strong, it faces the challenges of increasing inter-regional inequalities, a wide urban-rural poverty gap and gender-based inequalities. Almost half of the population and the majority of the poor live in rural areas. Employment potential in the agriculture, food and textile industries, especially for rural women and youth, is significant. However, while major progress has been achieved in the elimination of forced labour in cotton picking, there is a need for more support to the decent work agenda, and the transition to formal employment, as around 80% of agri-jobs are informal4, extensively exposing women to seasonal, low paid jobs lacking effective social security and protection. Furthermore, the employment of people with disabilities in rural areas represents a high challenge. In 2019 in rural areas, only 5.8 percent of men and women with disabilities aged 16–59 and 16–54 were officially employed. Employed persons with disabilities tend to work more in the informal sector, where discrimination on the basis of disability is high, and salaries are roughly half those in the formal sector. Children with learning disabilities face also institutional barriers in accessing vocational or higher education."}, {"bbox": [83, 1125, 1178, 1442], "category": "Text", "text": "The proposed Action intends to reinforce the engagement by the GoU to implement the Agri-Food Development Strategy 2020-2030 through budgetary support, policy dialogue, and capacity building measures. It will build on the milestones achieved through the EU engagement in this sector, which has been the only focal area of our cooperation so far. Complementing the implementation of a first EU budget support operation, which has been on-going since February 2020, the focus will be maintained on creating the enabling conditions for smallholder farmers, women and the most vulnerable to improve their livelihoods and general wellbeing, and to support the phasing out of a command-based economy. The objectives of the EU action reflect the commitment that the GoU has towards economic liberalisation, WTO accession, gender equality, transition to green economy, and the Paris Agreement, as overarching policy directions. The action is aligned with EU policies and responds to the demand of counterparts in Uzbekistan for sharing the EU know-how, in particular as related to the development of fair, healthy and environmentally-friendly food systems (“EU Farm to Fork Strategy” and the European Green Deal), support to family farming, food safety, integration into the global markets and the implementation of EPCA."}, {"bbox": [71, 1486, 1158, 1535], "category": "Footnote", "text": "² European Commission (2020): Farm to Fork Strategy, available at: https://food.ec.europa.eu/horizontal-topics/farm-fork-strategy_en"}, {"bbox": [71, 1535, 1158, 1583], "category": "Footnote", "text": "³ European Commission (2019): A European Green Deal, available at https://ec.europa.eu/info/strategy/priorities-2019-2024/european-green-deal_en"}, {"bbox": [71, 1583, 1158, 1633], "category": "Footnote", "text": "⁴ The ILO Decent Work Agenda is based on the following four pillars: full and productive employment, rights at work, social protection and the promotion of social dialogue"}, {"bbox": [1144, 1659, 1158, 1680], "category": "Page-footer", "text": "4"}]