NUR-SULTAN – Kazakhstan and the Netherlands concluded five trade deals in The Hague during the Oct. 30 Kazakh-Dutch Business Council meeting. Kazakh Prime Minister Askar Mamin, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte and other officials attended the meeting.
L-R: Kazakh Prime Minister Askar Mamin, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte shaking hands before their Oct. 30 meeting in The Hague. Photo credit: primeinister.kz.
The Netherlands is Kazakhstan’s largest foreign investor, injecting more than $92 billion in Kazakhstan since 1991. Investments from the Netherlands account for 24.9 percent of the total foreign investment inflow in Kazakhstan.
More than 900 companies with Dutch capital do business in Kazakhstan. Bilateral trade reached $6.5 billion in 2018 and $2.68 billion in the first half of 2019.
The event, which gathered more than 200 senior executives from manufacturing, agro-industry, financial services and private equity, chemicals, mining and metallurgy, alternative energy and clean tech, infrastructure, logistics, and digital industries, examined ways to boost the current figures.
During the business forum. Photo credit: primeminister.kz.
The business forum saw the signing of an agreement between K-Agro and Farm Frites to set up a potato processing plant in the Zhambyl Region in southern Kazakhstan. The cost of the project is estimated at $145 million and will be Farm Frites’ second project in Kazakhstan.
The Dutch company is one of the world’s largest potato processing companies.
Kazakhstan’s Garysh Sapary National Space Company and NEVASCO, which stands for Netherlands Value Adding Services Companies, will cooperate in remote sensing and geographic information systems (GIS).
The Kazakh National Agrarian University in Nur-Sultan will cooperate with Wageningen University, one of the world’s leading centres in natural sciences, natural resources management, crop production and animal husbandry.
L-R: Kazakh Prime Minister Askar Mamin and Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte visit World Horti Centre. Photo credit: primeminister.kz.
Kazakhstan’s Housing and Utilities Centre and Witteven+Bos will partner in the programme to build and reconstruct sewage treatment facilities.
Kazakhstan’s Dal Agro Park and Dutch Greenhouse Delta will build a 200-hectare agriculture park in the Turkestan Region in southern Kazakhstan.
Mamin and Rutte, during their bilateral meeting, explored prospects to grow trade and investment cooperation and increase cooperation in energy, finance, transport and logistics and agriculture.
“Kazakhstan’s First President Nursultan Nazarbayev laid a foundation for stable partner relations between Kazakhstan and the Netherlands. Head of the State Kassym-Jomart Tokayev maintains the continuity of multi-vector foreign policy and pays attention to strengthening the bilateral ties,” said Mamin, reported the Kazakh prime minister’s press service.
Rutte said Mamin’s visit will advance bilateral cooperation.
“Dutch and Kazakh companies can reinforce each other. That is why today they had the opportunity to get in touch in The Hague during a joint business council. I attended this meeting with fellow Prime Minister Mamin after a good discussion about trade, climate and cooperation in the field of agriculture,” wrote Rutte in his Twitter account.
During his visit, Mamin also met with the top management of Shell, Bitfury, Suez Group, Farm Frites and Dutch Fruit Solutions, discussing energy, data processing and block chain technologies, education and agriculture processing.
The Kazakh Prime Minister also visited the World Horti Centre, an international knowledge and innovation centre in commercial horticulture and home to the Dutch Greenhouse Demo Centre (Demokwekerij), a research greenhouse and school and universities specialised in horticulture.
