The venture’s exports rose by 25.4% year-on-year to 324.9 million cigarettes. Sales of cigarettes in internal market grew by 27.8% year-on-year to 8.823 billion.

BAT Uzbekistan increased cigarette production by 19.8% year-on-year to 10.46 billion and exports volume rose by 31.2% to 594.6 million.

British American Tobacco acquired 51% shares at Uztabak in 1994 and created UzBAT A.O JV (now BAT Uzbekistan). The charter capital of the venture is US$247.4 million. BAT holds 97.35% shares in the venture, State Propert Committee of Uzbekistan - 2.25% and labour - 0.4%.

Total investment programme of BAT Uzbekistan made up US$292 million, of which US$100 million is the cost of cigarette plant in Samarkand, which was built in 1997. The capacity of the plant is 12 billion cigarettes a year.