GOVERNMENT: Kazakhstan continues to attract foreign direct investment
This week President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev traveled to Doha, Qatar where the two countries discussed bilateral cooperation in numerous spheres, including agriculture, real estate, hotel management and petrochemical industry. Qatari authorities vowed to invest $100 million into the Kazakhstan-Qatar Investment Fund. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe paid his first-ever official visit to Kazakhstan together with heads of the largest Japanese companies this week as well. During the visit, Prime Minister Abe met with his Kazakhstani counterpart Karim Massimov, expressing hope that his visit and the Kazakhstan-Japan business forum will bring specific results. Karim Massimov, in turn, expressed confidence that the governments of the two countries will implement all agreements reached. Following the bilateral negotiations in Astana, Kazakhstan and Japan inked a number of memorandums and agreements on cooperation. Kazakhstan's Minister for Investment and Development Asset Issekeshev had a meeting with the management of the Japan Oil, Gas and Metals National Corporation (JOGMEC) on the margins of the abovementioned business forum. The sides mainly touched upon a joint project on geological exploration in Kazakhstan. This week first Vice Prime Minister of Kazakhstan Bakytzhan Sagintayev met with CEO of Rheinmetall AG Armin Pappeger to discuss prospects of bilateral cooperation and promising joint projects in Kazakhstan. As a result of the meeting, the German group and Kazakhstan Engineering JSC signed the memorandum of mutual understanding on cooperation in the sphere of education and professional training. On Thursday, Bakytzhan Sagintayev urged foreign investors to participate in the privatization of large Kazakhstani enterprises taking the floor at the 6th International Investment Forum Astana Invest-2015 in the Kazakh capital. At the 5th Central Asian Trade Forum in Almaty Kazakhstan's Minister of Economic Integration Zhanar Aitzhanova said that Kazakhstan's accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO) will deepen its trade ties with Central Asian neighbors. According to her, despite the fact that the Central Asian countries enjoy a duty free regime, so-called non-tariff and administrative barriers and discriminatory indirect taxes hinder development of trade and economic ties. "Given that, Kazakhstan's membership in the WTO will further liberalize its external trade in general and deepen economic ties with the Central Asian neighbors in particular," she said. The same day Chairman of the Investment Committee at the Ministry for Investment and Development Mr. Yerlan Khairov announced Kazakhstan's plans to join the Investment Committee of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in 2016. In his words, over the past decade the inflow of direct investment into Kazakhstan has exceeded $200 billion mark. "Kazakhstan climbed 12 spots up to №41 in the World Bank's Doing Business Report. Moreover, last year our country was among the top 30 countries that boast the biggest amount of foreign direct investment. It demonstrates that the measures taken by the Kazakh Government were highly appreciated by international experts," he added.
