He recalled that President set tasks to radically change attitude towards science, including allocation of funds to development of science and train scientific personnel.

Shermatov underlined that according to the World Bank, the share of allocated funds for research and development in Uzbekistan is less than 0.2% of GDP, 11 times less than the world average and 22 times less than in Korea (4.28% of GDP).

Considering that the GDP of Korea was US$1.41 trillion in 2014, the country allocated US$60 billion to science, which is almost equal with total GDP of Uzbekistan, he said. Shermatov underlined that this is 485 times more than the funds allocated to science in Uzbekistan (US$124 million, i.e. 0.2% of US$63 billion.

Deputy Minister said that if Uzbekistan also allocates 4.28% of GDP to science as in South Korea, the sum should be around US$2.7 billion.

Uzbekistan’s budget for 2018 allocated about US$48 million (389 billion soums) to science, he underlined.