President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev spoke about the end-of-year result of Kazakhstan and the CIS’s trade and economic development initiatives in an informal meeting of CIS leaders in St. Petersburg, QazMonitor reports citing the presidential press service.
Kazakhstan’s trade turnover with the CIS countries in the first ten months of 2022 grew by 11%, reaching nearly $30 billion. Despite the global economic situation, the trade turnover increased by $5 billion compared to the same period of last year, which reported a figure of $26.5 billion.
President Tokayev listed all the achievements that took place throughout the year, including the Astana Summit in October, which raised questions about a joint economic development plan until 2030.
Looking forward, he urged the leaders of the CIS countries to focus on solving urgent issues related to trade and logistics.
‘I would like to draw attention to the creation of favorable conditions for trade. We believe that we should substantially work on eliminating tariff and non-tariff barriers and preventing protectionism,” the President said.
He continued: “We need to establish cooperation on food security. A ministerial conference of CIS member countries to be held in Astana next year will be devoted to the search for common approaches in this sphere.
To raise transport efficiency and logistics projects, President Tokayev suggested creating new mechanisms and formats of cooperation. “The international North-South corridor, in which the Kazakhstan–Turkmenistan–Iran railway is an important transport route, is of particular importance," he said.
Another key area of cooperation he highlighted is the field of security. The joint program in combating terrorism and extremism for 2023-2025, adopted under Kazakhstan's chairmanship of the CIS committee, meets these objectives, said the President.
“We will soon begin preparing documents on the establishment of the Commonwealth Observer and Commonwealth Partner institutions. Of course, overall cultural and humanitarian cooperation and the strengthening of the linguistic space in the CIS are important. Granting the official status of the CIS Cultural Capital to St. Petersburg in 2023 will serve for the benefit of strengthening of the cultural relations between the CIS countries.”