Publication Details
Abstract
Regional digital policy in Uzbekistan rests on an assumption that is rarely tested. The assumption is that regions with better digital infrastructure also hold a wider export basket. This paper tests that assumption directly. It groups the fourteen administrative regions of the country with a K-means procedure applied to two dimensions, the regional ICT development index built on the framework of the International Telecommunication Union and an export concentration index of the Herfindahl and Hirschman type. The clustering is run four times, once for product exports, once for services, once for the combined basket and once for partner geography. The result does not support the assumption. Three stable types appear, and the ranking of regions by digital development does not match their ranking by export diversification. Navoi region stands second in digital development after the capital, yet it falls into the low diversification cluster in all four indices. The capital forms a cluster of its own with a mean index of 0.645, but its services exports are among the most concentrated in the country. The findings show that regional digital development and export diversification do not follow a uniform pattern across Uzbekistan, underscoring the need to assess digital progress alongside the structural composition of regional exports. The paper turns the typology into a policy framework in which monitoring targets and incentive instruments differ by region type rather than being applied uniformly across the country.