In Uzbekistan, the revival of the silk industry

Every early summer in Uzbekistan, Zoubaïda Pardaïeva harvests silkworm cocoons.

They will be transformed into a precious fabric following a long and inefficient process, which this Central Asian country, the third largest producer in the world, has vowed to modernize.

“Everything is done manually. The most complicated thing is taking care of the silkworms, then harvesting their cocoons without altering their quality,” Ms. Pardaïeva told AFP in Nourafchon, south of the capital Tashkent.

Silkworm cocoons in Nourafchon, June 2, 2024 in Uzbekistan (AFP/TEMUR ISMAILOV)

In the shade of an almond tree, with her fingers made expert by 40 years of experience, Ms. Pardaïeva removes white cocoons from dried branches: each contains a silk thread one kilometer long on average, secreted by the caterpillar of a butterfly domesticated for centuries, the mulberry bombyx.

During the breeding season, from April to June, “everyone is involved.

The men cut the mulberry branches to feed them and the women take care of the caterpillars, which require constant attention, explains the sixty-year-old.

The transformation into a textile prized for its strength and softness will require a few more steps: the silkworms will be suffocated at high temperatures in their cocoons.

A silkworm, caterpillar of the mulberry silkworm moth, in Nourafchon, on June 2, 2024 in Uzbekistan (AFP/TEMUR ISMAILOV)

They will then be dried and then immersed in boiling water, where the thread will be unwound and then woven.

In the neighboring barn, yellowish worms with heads barred by a black mask are eagerly shredding mulberry leaves.

“After the harvest, we will hand over the cocoons to the State,” said Ms. Pardaïeva, surrounded by other women “helping voluntarily.”

– “Coercion” –

Because if sericulture – the breeding of silkworms, an ancestral tradition in this country of the “Silk Road” – is liberalized under the leadership of President Chavkat Mirzioïev, it remains under state control and unprofitable.

Men carry dried branches with silkworms hanging on them in Nourafchon, June 2, 2024 in Uzbekistan (AFP/TEMUR ISMAILOV)

Consequence of decades of planned communist economy until 1991, then of a quarter of a century of isolation under former leader Islam Karimov.

“The silk industry is managed using methods borrowed from the Soviet past, with farmers forced to cultivate cocoons, particularly those who already have mulberry plantations,” Uzbek economist Yuli Yusoupov told AFP.

Like Janobil Tachibekov, a farmer in Nourafchon, who received “three cartons of silkworm eggs” from the Uzbek government this year.

“If I’m lucky, I’ll harvest 150 kilos of cocoons, which will bring me six million soums,” says the farmer, or around 450 euros, twice his monthly salary.

An employee of “Tumush Kola” dries silkworm cocoons in Kattakorgan, June 3, 2024 in Uzbekistan (AFP/STRINGER)

And if forced labor in cotton fields was abolished by President Mirziyoyev, Uzbek silkworm cocoons remain prohibited from importing into the United States for the “use of forced labor in their production”, despite denials from Tashkent.

“These elements of coercion on farmers, with prices fixed by the State, create problems of productivity and quality,” continues Mr. Yusupov, prosecuted and then cleared for his criticism of the industry.

– Liberalization of the sector –

The economist, however, sees “reasons to hope for changes in Uzbekistan in the silk sector”, which is growing globally.

A “Tumush Kola” employee sews silk in Kattakorgan, June 3, 2024 in Uzbekistan (AFP/STRINGER)

“The president has ordered to reform it from 2025 to put in place market mechanisms, we hope to see a revolutionary transition,” he said.

By 2027, Mr Mirziyoev wants to make the silk sector one of the country’s big employers, with two of the estimated 35 million Uzbeks contributing to the seasonal harvest, including the unemployed.

With 26,000 tonnes of silk produced in 2023, Uzbekistan wants to consolidate its third place in the world, behind China and India, which represent around 95% of world production, according to the International Commission for Sericulture.

An employee in a silk production factory in Kattakurgan, June 3, 2024 in Uzbekistan (AFP/TEMUR ISMAILOV)

M Mirzioyev also ordered an increase in the purchase prices of cocoons, mulberry plantations, tax exemption for breeders and groupings of farms to make production profitable.

The objective is to support exports, particularly to the European market and its luxury designers, in the form of raw materials but also finished products.

What Mariam Niyazova, founder of Tumush Tola (Silver Fiber, in Uzbek), is trying to do, one of the few Uzbek companies offering the entire silk cycle, from breeding worms to making clothes and bedding, in Kattakorgan, in the Samarkand region, some 400 km from Tashkent.

Mariam Niyazova and her son-in-law in their business Tumush Kola in Kattakorgan, June 3, 2024 in Uzbekistan (AFP/STRINGER)

“I bought equipment from China and South Korea in 2020 and managed to produce fabrics. It was difficult, due to the lack of specialists,” she explains, remembering the “years of stagnation” under Karimov.

Today, she is optimistic: “we are already exporting to Iran, China and Azerbaijan, and hope soon to Europe.”

© 2024 AFP

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