Digital Convergence without Retail Convergence: Regional Marketing Strategic Potential and Determinants of Retail Development in Uzbekistan

The article aims to explain why the rapid equalisation of digital access across Uzbekistan’s regions has not equalised retail development. On a balanced panel of 14 regions for 2015-2024 (140 observations), we measure regional inequality, test sigma- and beta-convergence, build an index of regional marketing strategic potential (IMSS) and estimate panel models. The Theil index of real retail turnover per capita rose by 22.3%. Internet coverage converged strongly (β = −0.0523; p < 0.001; half-life 13.3 years), retail did not (β = +0.00012; p = 0.987). The IMSS (Cronbach’s α = 0.8148; criterion R² = 0.8375) shows five regions, Khorezm among them, 8-16% below potential; the fixed-effects internet elasticity of retail turnover is 0.2894.