Prime minister Alikhan Smailov gave a report on the work being done to attract foreign capital to the country at a government meeting today, QazMonitor reports citing the prime minister's press service.
Smailov said that the government is planning to attract at least $150 billion in direct foreign investments in the next 7 years. According to the results of the first half of this year, the country received $14.5 billion in direct investment, which is 28% more than last year.
“We are working with a pool of 850 investment projects worth ₸30 trillion, the implementation of which will lead to the creation of 131,000 new jobs. By the end of this year, around 190 projects worth ₸2 trillion will be launched,” said Smailov.
The prime minister also spoke about the situation with the relocation of foreign companies to Kazakhstan. As of now, 19 companies have already been relocated.
The government developed legislative amendments to rework the public-private partnership (PPP) mechanisms. This will minimize the possibility of bypassing the public procurement procedures, strengthen the anti-corruption measures, improve the overall quality of projects, and maintain the balance between the state and business.
The government has implemented a sectoral approach to the support measures of small and medium-sized businesses. The state support measures aim to cover a maximum number of businesses by reducing the lending amount from ₸7 billion to ₸3 billion.
Moreover, preferential micro-crediting at 5% was introduced in small industrial towns and villages.
"An extensive audit is underway to identify excessive business requirements. As of now, we’ve identified about 7,000 requirements that will be abolished,” said Smailov.
Reforms to the system of state control have also begun. The system will transition from inspections to automated risk management, which will be launched in the first half of next year.
It is expected that these measures will incentivize the growth of small and medium-sized businesses, increasing the number of employees in the field to 4.7 million people.
