Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev has proposed a regional model of climate integration for Central Asia, speaking at the COP31 UN climate conference in Antalya on November 11, reported the Ecology news agency (NIA Ekologiya).
“No country can solve climate problems alone,” Mirziyoyev said. The model has three components:
- climate data: shared information on climate risks with the World Meteorological Organization, starting with early warning systems and extending to joint monitoring of glacier melt, land degradation and changes in water regimes;
- eco-technologies: turning the ECO-EXPO exhibition into a permanent investment and technology platform for soil restoration, carbon capture in arid ecosystems and the fight against dust storms;
- finance: concessional grants and “blue” and “arid” financing instruments, developed with development banks and funds, for water and dryland projects.
Mirziyoyev reported that Uzbekistan has cut emissions per unit of GDP by 35% and aims for 50% by 2035. It plans to generate 54% of its electricity from renewables by 2030. Water intensity has nearly halved in ten years, more than 60% of irrigated land uses water-saving technologies, and forest plantations have grown by 6 million hectares, a third of them in the Aral Sea area.
The initiative builds on Uzbekistan’s upcoming chairmanship of the International Fund for Saving the Aral Sea in 2027. Mirziyoyev suggested the approach could also be applied in other regions of the world.
CentralasianLIGHT.org,
November 12, 2026