Kazakhstan redirecting foreign investments for industrialization

This year Kazakhstan will implement seven projects totaling $237 million with the participation of anchor investors and transnational companies, such as JAC, Hikma, Carmeuse Group, Cremonini, Peugeot, Citroёn, IVECO, and Tenaris, in the pharmaceutical, chemical, agro-processing, mining, metallurgical, and construction industries, Kazakh Minister for Investment and Development Aset Isekeshev said on May 17 at a roundtable on improvement of the country’s investment climate, The Times of Central Asia reported.

The minister said that over the past 11 years, direct foreign investments in Kazakhstan have amounted to $212 billion, “The industrialization program launched in 2010 has helped us change the investment structure in favor of the processing sector. Some 77 percent of all foreign investments in the processing sector since 2005 have come during the years of the program.”

He said that the manufacturing industry and agriculture are priority areas for investment now. “Work will also be continued with transnational corporations, because today technology and competence comes from large companies, and therefore the work of [Kazakh] embassies and ambassadors will be primarily directed at working with them.”