ASTANA – Vice Minister of the Ministry for Investments and Development Berik Kamaliyev recently updated the press on road construction and negotiations with foreign airlines to launch new routes during EXPO 2017.
Photo credit: kapital.kz
“We will continue to work on our projects in Centre-South, Centre-East, Beineu-Aktau, Aktobe, Atyrau-Astrakhan, Almaty-Ust-Kamenogorsk, Astana-Petropavlovsk-Russian border, Uralsk-Kamenka, Uzynagash-Otar, Zhetybai-Zhanaozen. In general, it is planned to reconstruct about 6,000 kilometres of roads,” said Kamaliyev, the press office of the ministry reports.
In the regions, 756 kilometres of asphalt and cement concrete pavement were laid. Approximately 3 million tonnes of road metal, 250,000 tonnes of cement and 125,000 tonnes of road bitumen made in Kazakhstan were used for the construction. Nearly 75,000 people and more than 30 contractors, including 20 domestic companies, were involved in the construction.
As a result, 75 percent of all planned construction works were finished within the first nine months of this year. The government plans to open the Western Europe – Western China transit corridor as well as Astana-Temirtau, Almaty-Kapshagai-Taldykorgan, Beineu-Shetpe and Kokshetau-Petropavlovsk routes by the end of the year.
In addition, the ministry introduced a new mechanism for subsidising passenger transportation for socially significant routes. A corresponding law was signed by President Nursultan Nazarbayev on April 9. The new mechanism aims to ensure the transparency of the subsidising in railway passenger transportation. At the same time, it provides long-term financing for passenger transportation companies for 15-20 years. The last fact will allow the companies to purchase passenger cars using borrowed funds, which will empower new technologies and provide increased passenger traffic quality.
Also, the ministry is working on increasing domestic and international motor transportation and achieved good results. In this year, it supposed that transport fleet will be increased by 10 percent and the share of Kazakh carriers in the international market will reach 43 percent.
The vice-minister said government negotiates with several foreign airlines to launch new routes for the period of EXPO 2017. He noted that this initiative supports the expo by Open Sky system.
He emphasised that the ministry negotiated and signed agreements with a Finnish airline and recently held talks with a Polish airline.
As of today, there are agreements with Hungarian, Austrian, Czech and Chinese airlines.
