Azernews.Az

By Aynur Jafarova

Kazakhstan is interested in taking several measures to improve the investment climate in the country.

In his recent speech, Kazakh Economy and Budget Planning Minister Erbolat Dossayev said the country plans to introduce additional measures to improve the investment climate.

The Central Asian country particularly intends to establish unilateral visa-free requirements for most of the developed countries for a period of 90 days and provide investor visas for the heads of structural departments in foreign companies, he said.

The terms of the lease on agricultural lands for foreigners who invest in commodity agricultural production will also increase.

Kazakhstan will also introduce the one-stop shop principle for investors and create an investment ombudsman institute.

The Kazakh government decided to accelerate measures for improving the investment climate in the country after President Nursultan Nazarbayev said work on attracting foreign investments in the country is not carried out at the sufficient level.

The Kazakh president instructed the government to adopt a law aimed at attracting a new wave of investments.

A draft law on improving the investment climate is expected to be introduced at the Kazakh parliament before June 1, 2014.

The draft law includes a new format of contracts with investors describing the government support measures in details.

One of the measures is the compensation of up to 30 percent of the investment costs by the state after commissioning a facility.

The second measure is being exempted from corporate income tax, and the third is the long-term order of goods and services of investors by national holdings, national companies, and government bodies.

Kazakhstan also exempts investors from corporate income tax for 10 years and ensures long-term guaranteed orders for goods and services by national holdings, national companies, and state agencies of Kazakhstan.

Kazakhstan is interested not only in foreign investment, but also in domestic funds. The country plans to allocate one trillion tenges for economic development in 2014-2015.

It will also allocate over 164 billion tenges to financing national geological projects in 2015-2019.

The Kazakh government has already taken measures to support entrepreneurs, essentially facilitating the taxation regime and streamlining the proceedings of business registration.

The previously taken measures have already shown significant results, and the volume of foreign investments in Kazakhstan's manufacturing industry has doubled in the past three years.

The volume of foreign investments in this sector increased from $1.8 billion in 2009 to $3.4 billion in 2012.

The total volume of direct foreign investment grew by 34 percent, reaching $28 billion.

The volume of investments made in Kazakhstan's oil and gas sector amounted to about $10 billion in 2013.

The U.S., China and EU countries are the top 3 leading countries where investments in the mentioned spheres are concerned.