Kazakhstan agricultural exports to China soar 15 pct in H1

NUR-SULTAN: Kazakhstan’s agricultural exports to China reached 489,000 tons, or 196 million U.S. dollars, in the first half of this year (H1), up by 15 percent year on year, the agriculture ministry said on Wednesday.
According to the ministry, 274,000 tons of crop products and 2,000 tons of livestock products were exported to China, up by 11 percent and 25 percent respectively.
A total of 576 Kazakh enterprises have been granted permission to supply their agricultural products to China, among which 90 companies export livestock products and 486 export crop products, the ministry said.
The Kazakh government has pledged to boost its production and export of agricultural products in recent years. In the first eight months of this year, the country’s agricultural output reached 2.4 trillion tenge (about 5.66 billion dollars), up by 4.9 percent year on year.
Meanwhile, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are considering increasing flights between them, the press service of the Kazakh Ministry of Industry and Infrastructure Development announced on Wednesday.
The announcement was made after Kazakh Minister of Industry and Infrastructure Development Beibut Atamkulov and Uzbek Ambassador to Kazakhstan Saidikram Niyazkhodjaev held talks in Nur-Sultan.
The two sides agreed to increase the frequency of flights on the Tashkent-Almaty route which opened last week and resume the route between Tashkent and Nur-Sultan. They also discussed plans to open flights from Kazakhstan’s Turkestan, Taraz and Aktau to Uzbekistan’s Samarkand, Nukus and Urgench, respectively.
The two sides touched upon the issue of opening a railway link between Uzbekistan and Russia through the territory of Kazakhstan.
In addition to Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan has so far restored regular flights to Turkey, South Korea, the Netherlands, Belarus, Germany, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan and the United Arab Emirates.
Furthermore, President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev extended congratulations to the participants of the 8th Forum of Machine Builders of Kazakhstan (MBK).
The President’s congratulatory letter has been read out by Meiram Pshembayev, Chairman of the Board of the Union of Machine Builders of Kazakhstan.
In his letter, the President underscored the Forum’s role it plays in providing a dialogue platform for the State and businesses to discuss pressing issues regarding machine-building.
The Forum that is taking place online also features the first international online exhibition in machine-building and metal working.
The President also noted that despite the coronavirus pandemic the domestic machine-building has been demonstrating an upward trend of 14% this year.
According to him, machine-building has vaulted to a leading position in the manufacturing sector.
The county is to adopt an industrial policy law, promote domestic producer support measures so as to fulfill the tasks set in the President’s Address, namely to create a diversified, technologically advanced economy as well as a 1.5-fold increase in manufacturing.–Agencies