Board of the Ministry of Innovative Development refused to allocate funding for a project to create a mobile application for the book “Strategy of New Uzbekistan”. The initiative was put forward by Akmal Saidov, First Deputy Speaker of the Legislative Chamber of Oliy Majlis. The contractor is a non-governmental non-profit organization “Center for Sustainable Development”. 

The meeting ended with a heated discussion between the Board Chairman, Minister of Innovative Development Ibrokhim Abdurakhmanov and Deputy Chairman for scientific-technical issues in the direction of “Philology and Social Sciences” Kiyomiddin Nazarov.  

Minister: Where will this money go, why so much? 

Jasur Ikramshikov, department head: Placement of a mobile application on Google Play, placement on iOS, Creative Cloud, expenses for a mobile application designer, android developer, backend developer, additional circulation. 

Minister: A salary of 100 million soums a month is a lot or a little, why is no one talking about it? 

Kiyomiddin Nazarov: The project also provides for business trips. The experience of creating a mobile application will be studied in Korea and India. 

Minister: There is no need to go to Korea, we already have experience in creating a mobile application. There is an online development strategy platform for 2022-2026, it is working. 

Kiyomiddin Nazarov: We are talking about the book “Strategy of New Uzbekistan”, the book has theoretical aspects to a certain extent. This is different from strategy. We have studied this issue a lot. 

Five tasks have been set per year, and we have allocated funds for this. 4 items are being prepared in 1,000 copies. In the Center for Sustainable Development says that they are paying extra expenses. 

Minister: How much money is allocated for outsourcing? If it is given for outsourcing, the application will be ready, won’t it? 

Kiyomiddin Nazarov: The problem is not in the mobile application, but in its implementation and constant content. 

Minister: There are state organizations and khokimiyats for implementation. I see that the project was completed incorrectly. A mobile application costs 269 million soums, about 300 million soums. After all, the President has already written the entire book, it does not require additions, you will not add a word there. 

Kiyomiddin Nazarov: The main funds are not going to the mobile application itself, because I myself do not understand this, that’s why I asked to mention how much it would take. They want to make a textbook, a collection and a dictionary. 

Minister: Why do we need a dictionary? 

Kiyomiddin Nazarov: We do not have a “New Uzbekistan” dictionary, we need it. Everyone speaks differently. 

Minister: What do you mean when you say the vocabulary of “New Uzbekistan”? 

Kiyomiddin Nazarov: The Center wants to create a dictionary called “Development Strategy for New Uzbekistan”, which will include concepts such as what is “development” and what is “New Uzbekistan”. It would be nice to have a pocket dictionary so-called “Development Strategy”. They don’t require a lot of money. 

Minister: I don’t understand what the dictionary of “New Uzbekistan” is. The strategy was written, new terms did not appear by themselves, the word “development” did not change. 

Kiyomiddin Nazarov: When the book of the first president “High spirituality is an invincible force” was published, it was a huge dictionary of 800 words. 290 new words were added with the “Manaviyat” center. Even then the dictionary “Spirituality” was created. 

Minister: Every book has a glossary, but it’s not a dictionary.

Kiyomiddin Nazarov: I told the center that the maximum amount allocated by the Ministry of Innovation is 1 billion 200 million soums. There wouldn’t be a question if they didn’t ask so much. 

Minister: Financing of annual scientific projects in the world does not exceed $100,000. If you receive non-NASA projects, the annual funding will not exceed $100,000. Vocabulary should be treated strictly; to read the development strategy, you can use a glossary of difficult-to-understand terms, but not a dictionary. 

Now everyone will laugh and talk about us, everyone is talking about the “New Uzbekistan” and what is “new” in it. We need to explain it properly. If we say that we will make a dictionary, then imagine. We must know our mistake, we open a new direction without realizing it. Therefore, I expressed my opinion, I want to correctly evaluate everything in science. If a mobile application costs 800 million soums, what is the use of 18 people working on it? I did not understand the essence of the research. 

After that, Namoz Mirzayev, Chairman of the Scientific-Technical Council for Development of Informatization and ICT, commented on the situation with expenses. 

“You say that we will make 1,000 copies of manuals and brochures. It is useless, we will not cover the entire population. Instead, let’s release their electronic version and post it on the Internet. Money won’t be spent on this. I haven’t heard of business trips. I think that you don’t have to go abroad to learn about overseas experiences. If something is not available in open sources, then when you go there, you still will not receive this information,” Namoz Mirzayev said. 

Ibrahim Abdurakhmanov, taking into account the likelihood that the dictionary of “New Uzbekistan” will cause a negative reaction among the people, said: 

“This is not the first time we are making a mobile app. Seeing me online, some may draw different conclusions. I am not against the “New Uzbekistan dictionary”. But we can cause the opposite reaction in our people”. 

According to a statement from the Ministry of Innovative Development, the collegium refused to allocate funding for the project.