Articles by Staff report

The eighth French Cinema Today film festival, which traditionally presents the audience with the best novelties of French cinema, will be held April 22-25 in Kazakhstan. The festival will be presented for the first time in two cities, Astana and Almaty. The programme will include films of various genres: adventure, biopics, comedies with Pierre Richard…

ASTANA – The “Fantastic” symphony and concert featuring Italian oboist Gianfranco Bortolato premiered April 15 at the Astana Opera House. First oboe at the La Scala Opera House, the Royal Theatre of Turin and the Roman Opera, Bortolato performed a Richard Strauss concert for oboe and orchestra with the Astana Opera symphonic orchestra in the…

ASTANA – The Kazakh Ministry of Education has created a working group to transfer the Kazakh alphabet based on the Cyrillic script to Latin, the ministry’s Science Committee Chairperson Bolatbek Abdrasilov announced April 13. The announcement followed Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev’s direction to adopt a single standard of the Kazakh alphabet in the Latin script…

ASTANA – Kazakh SaryarkaAvtoProm and GM Uzbekistan recently signed an agreement to cooperate on production of the new model of Nexia R3 of the Ravon brand. The companies are in the final stages of preparation to produce the cars using the large-block assembly (SKD – semi knocked down) technology in Kostanai, according to the press…

ASTANA – Four agreements and a framework agreement on cooperation and trade with Food Corp. were signed between Kazakhstan and Chinese companies as part of a two-day visit to Beijing. The Kazakh delegation, headed by Deputy Prime Minister and Agriculture Minister Askar Myrzakhmetov, discussed increasing quotas for Kazakh grain supply to China and strengthening investment…

ASTANA – The Immortal Regiment of Astana – Peace March will be held on Victory Day to commemorate the memory of Soviet soldiers, according to the city akimat (administration) press service. The Astana Department of Internal Policy supported the initiative. The event is held annually to preserve the personal memory of the descendants of the…

Prime Minister of Kazakhstan Bakytzhan Sagintayev visited the Ui Kurylysy Kombinaty house-building plant in the Aktobe region March 30. The company uses technologies for the rapid construction of residential buildings. During the visit, the prime minister inspected the production lines and reviewed a report on the technological process of creating panels and structures for house…

ASTANA – A charity event devoted to World Autism Awareness Day was held April 2 in the Keruen City shopping mall, according to the press service of the Bolashak Corporate Fund. More than 50 parents, five foundations and public organisations have united to carry out the campaign aimed at spreading information about the problem of…

ASTANA – The Karaganda administration in collaboration with the Er Nur & Nika public fund of Kazakh-Korean friendship plan to erect a monument to legend of Soviet-era rock music Viktor Tsoi on Olimpic Street. Competition for the best draft design of the monument was announced in early March, according to ekaraganda.kz. Viktor Tsoi was a…

ASTANA – Astana Opera held two concerts, “Eshe raz o lyubvi” (“Once again about Love”) on March 14 and “Vesennie napevy” (“Spring Tunes”) March 17, to welcome spring. “Once again about Love” featured lyrical music by classical and Kazakh composers, arias and duets from operas performed by the theatre’s leading soloists. These included Nemorino aria…

ASTANA – The first ease of doing business rating of Kazakh regions will be compiled this year, said Economic Research Institute head Serzhan Madiyev. Based on international and domestic experience, it aims to help the government to more precisely and purposefully provide regional support. Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev noted the necessity of creating the city…

ASTANA – Numerous celebrations have been held around Astana for the Nauryz holiday. On March 16-17, the programme started with the festival for people with limited abilities “A creation without borders.” On the days of Nauryz, March 21-22, folk festivals with fairs, concerts, sports and entertainment events were held in different parts of the capital,…

ASTANA – Qazaq Air will introduce March 26 a new flight route between Shymkent and Astana. “Shymkent is one of the most densely populated and, at the same time, economically developed cities of the country. Since the establishment of the company in 2015, Qazaq Air has connected the citizens of this sunny region with the…

ASTANA – South Kazakhstan region resident Tanabai Shyntasov plans to create a commercial nut garden. The entrepreneur has already planted seedlings of fruit trees and grapes in the Saryagash district. Today, the garden area is more than 90 hectares. Practically the whole territory is equipped with a drip irrigation system. About 50 people work there…

ASTANA – A new international tourism route passing through Kazakhstan will be launched in April, Marat Igaliyev, head of the Tourism Industry Department of the Kazakh Ministry of Investment and Development announced recently. According to the head of the department, he discussed this project with a colleague from Kyrgyzstan as part of the seventh meeting…

Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev recently signed a decree, effective immediately, allocating 1.1 trillion tenge (US$3.2 billion) to improve the nation’s banking sector.  The document was published on the portal of the information and legal system of normative legal acts Adilet. Earlier, Deputy Chairman of the National Bank of Kazakhstan Oleg Smolyakov said the government will…

ASTANA – KazTransGas and government officials are reviewing a feasibility study to build a pipeline that would fully supply natural gas to Astana residents by 2021. Within a month, they will be able to calculate the efficiency of the new gas pipeline, gas tariffs for Astana residents and compare the costs with coal prices, said…

ASTANA – The Standard & Poor’s recently affirmed RBK Bank’s long-term and short-term counterparty credit ratings at the B-/C level, a press release of Bank RBK reported. “Maintaining the rating at the same level under turbulent conditions in Kazakhstan’s banking market indicates a stable and high level of bank management and credibility to the strategy…

The Kazakh Ministry of Energy plans to start exporting domestic gas to China this year. At present, 18,000 kilometres of main and 30,000 kilometres of distribution gas pipelines have been built, which to date have transported 173 billion cubic metres of transit gas, including 35 billion cubic metres last year, and additional capacities of the…

ASTANA – Businesses supported by funding from the East Kazakhstan region are set to launch production of medical implants developed by local scientists, 24.kz reports. “The region’s administration has provided businesses the opportunity to take advantage of local scientists’ development and offer state support. Scientists applied for funding to the Ministry of Education and Science…

ASTANA – Prime Minister Bakytzhan Sagintayev recently responded to concerns over the high cost of hosting EXPO 2017. “We will host the expo for three months. I understand that a lot of skeptics speak out about why we have spent so much money. Thirteen billion tenge (US$ 40.5 million) was allocated for the Universiade. Taking…

ASTANA – A U.S. State Department official praised the progress of EXPO 2017 preparations after a recent visit to the expo site, according to the Astana EXPO 2017 national company. “We looked at the international exhibition pavilions and I saw a huge amount of work carried out by the organisers. I am very impressed. At…

ASTANA – Fifteen countries are getting ready to present their national cuisine at EXPO 2017 with more than 10,000 square metres of the exhibition area to be allotted for commercial catering facilities. Daulet Yerkimbayev, director of the Astana EXPO 2017 commercialisation department announced interim results on competition among catering renters, according to the company’s press…

ASTANA – The Accounts Committee for control over execution of the national budget audited the Samruk Kazyna Sovereign Wealth Fund and identified a number of violations related to the budget programme’s target indicators. The findings were reported by accounts committee member Aigul Mukhametkarim at a meeting in Astana early in February. The so-called People’s Initial…

Shymkent was recently named the country’s safest city with the lowest crime rate, according to the official statistics. Compared to other major cities, the second most populous city in Kazakhstan had the lowest rate of violent crimes, such as homicide and rape last year. The majority of criminal offences, about 60 percent, were theft. The…