BAKU, Azerbaijan, Apr. 27
By Nargiz Sadikhova - Trend:
USAID’s energy projects are focused on helping the Central Asia region liberalize the power sector, the USAID official told Trend.
Talking about active projects, the official said that USAID’s Competitiveness, Trade, and Jobs activity facilitates trade and employment in horticulture, tourism, transport, and logistics across the five Central Asian economies.
“By incentivizing firms to become more regionally competitive and by addressing cross-border impediments to trade, USAID helps to develop a more diverse and competitive private sector and generate export-driven growth,” the official said.
The official noted that the organization’s projects also reduce barriers to trade within Central Asia as well as between the Central Asia region and other economies and harmonize regional trade legislation and policies to boost economic growth and job creation.
“Modern energy services are crucial for economic growth and prosperity and play a critical role in ensuring regional stability. USAID’s energy projects are focused on helping the Central Asia region liberalize the power sector to encourage greater private investment, rebuild a regional power market, and generate low-cost energy using the region’s diverse mix of potential energy resources—particularly renewable sources such as wind, solar, hydro, and biomass,” the official said.
The official noted that an example of USAID’s successful energy interventions is our assistance with renewable energy auctions in Kazakhstan for over 1,400 megawatts of solar, wind, and hydropower electricity projects, leveraging nearly $2 billion in private investment.
“Across the region, women are underrepresented in the workforce and make less money than their male counterparts. Since gender equality and women’s empowerment are at the core of our development work, our projects focus on addressing the barriers that keep women from having equal access to finance, market opportunities, and training they need to succeed in business,” the official said.
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