As of February 1, 2023, 1,539 ethnic Kazakhs have returned to their historical homeland and were granted the status of Kandas, QazMonitor reports.
A total of 1.1 million ethnic Kazakhs have returned to the country since 1991.
Among the Kandas who arrived in Kazakhstan, more than half were from Uzbekistan. The rest were from China (16.3%), Russia (15.9%), Turkmenistan (8.4%), Mongolia (4.5%), and other countries (4.9%).
They mostly settled in Almaty (27%), Mangistau (16.6%), Turkestan (7.1%), and Zhambyl (3.6%) regions as well as the cities of Astana (10.5%), Almaty (7.6%), and Shymkent (6.5%).
As of February 1, the number of ethnic migrants of working age is 69.1%. People under the working age constitute 22.7% and 8.2% are pensioners.
In terms of education, 20.1% have higher education, 40.9% have specialized secondary education, 35.2% have general secondary education and 3.8% have no education.
