The governments of Uzbekistan and Afghanistan are readying an agreement on trade and cooperation in transit of goods, which is expected to increase the two-way trade turnover, the Minister of Foreign Trade of Uzbekistan Elyor Ganiev said.
"The agreement will boost mutual trade, we have the reserves and opportunities to bring the trade volume to at least $ 1 billion by the end of this year" he said commenting on the meeting of the Presidents of Uzbekistan and Afghanistan on the sidelines of the SCO summit in Astana last week.
Ganiev added that following the meeting, the sides reached an agreement to arrange supplies from Uzbekistan to Afghanistan of up to 300,000 tons of mineral fertilizers, 2,000 units of agricultural machinery, up to 250,000 tons of wheat and other products that are in demand in Afghanistan.
He said that, the two leaders reportedly mentioned the importance of commencing in shortest time the designing and construction of the Mazar-i-Sharif-Shibergan-Maymana-Herat rail link, which will create a transport economic corridor in the north-west of Afghanistan.
