Kazakhstan should move to a new economic model, having all the opportunities to make a powerful breakthrough in development, as noted today by Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev in his annual state ofthe nation address. The Head of State stressed that in order to become a truly developed country, it is necessary to combine the current political reforms with deep and comprehensive socio-economic transformations. As noted by the President, no long-term goals will be set within the new economic policy. All the tasks of the current state ofthe nation address should be solved within three years. It is pivotal now to create an industrial framework. Therefore, an emphasis will be placed on the accelerated development of the manufacturing sector. To this end, high value-added clusters will appear in Kazakhstan. According to President Tokayev, special focus should be placed on deep processing of metals, oil, gas and carbon chemistry, heavy engineering, uranium enrichment, production of automotive components and fertilizers.
“The state, together with large enterprises, should ensure closed-loop manufacturing in the country. This will require the application of both regulatory and incentive mechanisms. The manufacturing industry should receive raw materials in sufficient quantities and at reasonable prices. It is also important to increase the volume of domestic goods in regulated purchases and fully launch the offtake system. The share of offtake contracts with domestic producers should be increased to at least 10 percent or two trillion tenge annually,” said Tokayev.
Mentioning the agro-industrial sector, President Tokayev noted that Kazakhstan should become one of the Eurasia’s leading agricultural centers. The goal is to increase the share of processed agricultural products to 70 percent within three years. This will require a revision of the tax policy, which should promote processing. Other tasks include consolidating domestic agricultural companies and expanding markets. The latter should be provided by the government. Additionally, an agro-technological hub to attract new technologies to the agricultural sector will be created in the country. It will need to establish cooperation with foreign agro-science centers. The President also pledged to support private scientific and technological initiatives and instructed to adapt educational programs to the needs of the agricultural sector.
“It is time for serious reforms in crop production. It is important to diversify crops, increase the areas of highly profitable crops, reduce water-intensive and monoculture crops. It is also necessary to focus on providing farmers with domestic seeds, breeding and cultivating new productive varieties,” added Kazakh President.
Web-editor: Bayan
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