Tensions are rising once more in Uzbekistan’s japanese Andijon area, the place farmers say they’re being coerced into “voluntarily” surrendering their land to native authorities — plots of farmland that in some instances are later leased to Chinese language buyers.
Uzbek officers preserve that every one transfers are voluntary, absolutely authorized, and they aren’t giving farmland to overseas homeowners, Chinese language or in any other case. However farmers concerned in rising cotton, greens, and fruit from japanese Uzbekistan who spoke to RFE/RL describe threats and late-night visits from native officers meant to stress them into signing over their land and forfeit their livlihoods.
Underneath Uzbek regulation, personal agricultural land possession does not exist and a farmer leases state land for as much as 49 years. The federal government cannot override that contract until lease funds go unpaid or if the land is signed over voluntarily.
Reporting by RFE/RL — together with interviews with farmers, authorities officers, and a evaluate of authorized paperwork — reveals that native officers in Uzbekistan’s Ferghana Valley, an space within the nation’s east lined in cotton farms that borders Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, are counting on intimidation and secrecy to to push farmers off their land in order that it may be leased for initiatives involving Chinese language buyers.
“They got here to my home, pressured me and my spouse right into a automobile, and took us to the district administration workplace,” Zoirjon Gapparov, the pinnacle of one of many main farms within the Qurganteppa district that principally produces various kinds of greens, instructed RFE/RL, describing a go to from the native police as a part of what he described as a authorities stress marketing campaign that started in December 2024.
“First [they took me] to the deputy governor for agriculture, Shukhrat Qamchiev, then to the district governor. They mentioned it was a presidential order that our land should be given to the Chinese language,” he mentioned.
Gapparov mentioned that he refused stress to signal an utility to give up the land to the state and that, after the incident, his cotton fields have been often visited by police and prosecutors. He mentioned that police additionally tried to intimidate his employees into signing statements that the farmland was illegally leased.
When he visited native officers once more in September 2025, he was instructed that his land had already been reassigned.
“They mentioned I wasn’t a farmer anymore, that my land was given to the Chinese language,” Gapparov recalled. “They claimed I had no authorized papers, though I’ve all of the paperwork.”
A New System To Switch Management Of Farmland
RFE/RL’s Uzbek Service reported final 12 months that farmland in a number of Andijon districts in japanese Uzbekistan was being handed to Chinese language corporations. After that report in April, transfers quickly stopped, however farmers say the stress quietly resumed months later.
China is Uzbekistan’s largest overseas investor, accounting for the biggest share of overseas capital inflows and new initiatives, however the rising Chinese language presence can be fueling anxiousness among the many nation’s farmers, particularly about prized farmland being prioritized for overseas buyers.
Dilmurod Xojamberdiev, the pinnacle of the Qurgonteppa district agriculture division and one of many officers who mentioned that Gapparov’s land could be given to Chinese language buyers, instructed RFE/RL that the land was leased to Chinese language buyers, however possession was not transferred.
“Based on the federal government’s determination, a directorate was created in Uzbekistan, and the land was given to that directorate,” he mentioned. “Uzbek regulation doesn’t enable farmland to be transferred to overseas residents.”
Requested whether or not Chinese language corporations grew crops within the space final 12 months, Xojamberdiev acknowledged they’d.
“They rented it from the directorate, not from me or the district governor,” he mentioned. “The directorate can lease to whoever it desires. The governor doesn’t determine that.”
Underneath a Cupboard of Ministers decree adopted in Could 2025, such directorates have been established in Andijon and 6 different areas — together with Jizzakh, Namangan, Tashkent, Fergana, Syrdaryo, and Kashkadaryo.
Every directorate, consisting of 5 employees members, is empowered to supervise environment friendly land use and to sublease farmland to native or overseas buyers “in accordance with the regulation.”
Based on Uzbekistan’s Nationwide Statistics Committeethe nation had 17,900 enterprises with overseas participation, together with 4,873 with Chinese language capital by December 2024. That development has continued at a speedy tempo, with greater than 1,500 further Chinese language corporations registered by the top of 2025.
‘Voluntary Solely On Paper’
Different farmers describe comparable experiences to Gapparov’s.
The pinnacle of Azizabonu Durdonasi farm that cultivates cereal crops and cotton, Azizakhon Ergasheva, who agreed to speak to RFE/RL, claims she was taken from her house shortly after midnight by police and pressured to write down an announcement giving up her 40 hectares of land for cotton farming “to the Chinese language.”
“I used to be sick and exhausted on the time. Ultimately, I signed it. It was ‘voluntary’ solely on paper,” Ergasheva mentioned.
Xojamberdiev, the pinnacle of the Qurgonteppa district agriculture division, mentioned that land is taken solely from farmers with money owed or those that failed to satisfy manufacturing plans.
He named Ergasheva as one of many indebted farmers, however she mentioned that officers purposefully racked up her money owed by setting unrealistic cotton quotas and issues with a drip irrigation mission promoted by the district authorities.
“They pressured us to signal contracts for 40 centners of cotton per hectare, despite the fact that our soil couldn’t yield that a lot,” Ergasheva mentioned. A yield of 40 centners of uncooked cotton per hectare is taken into account a top-tier harvest in trendy cotton farming, in accordance to the United Nations’ Meals and Agriculture Group (FAO).
“We couldn’t meet the goal and fell into debt. Then the agency they really useful for drip irrigation took my cash and disappeared,” she mentioned. “They dug one gap and ran away. And guess what? The district administration really useful them!”
Orifjon Qayumov, the pinnacle of the Qurgonteppa District Farmers’ Council, a public affiliation with sturdy ties to the Uzbek authorities, mentioned no overseas buyers, “together with the Chinese language,” are at the moment working on the seized plots.
“Land is taken solely voluntarily or by courtroom determination,” he mentioned. “Farmers switch it to the reserve by their very own request. The regional governor established an agricultural directorate, which now holds the land legally. We’ll see what occurs within the spring.”
Farmers dispute that model, saying no courtroom summons have been issued and that signatures have been extracted below stress, together with threats of arrest and shock house visits from police.
Two farmers who requested anonymity out of concern of reprisals instructed RFE/RL they have been taken from their houses to the native police station, the place they have been pressured to signal “voluntary” switch statements below the supervision of district governor Alisher Xalilov.
Greater than 20 farmers in Ergasheva’s district, and almost 50 throughout Andijon area, additionally declare to have misplaced cash to the identical irrigation contractor that was really useful to her by the federal government.
Ergasheva mentioned her 40 hectares, formally taken “for Chinese language funding,” have been really handed to a rich native businessman, Bahodir Saidaliev.
“He got here and leveled the whole lot I’d constructed: the orchard, even the mulberry timber I raised silkworms on,” she mentioned. “He mentioned he’d plant high-efficiency candy cherries. As an alternative, they planted wild ones that dried out. Now the land is barren and lined in weeds.”
