Implementation of large-scale infrastructural initiatives of Head of State launched by Government
Prime Minister of Kazakhstan Olzhas Bektenov held a meeting on the implementation of instructions of the Head of State Kassym-Jomart Tokayev to improve the quality of life in the country, announced at the third meeting of the National Kurultai "Adal adam - Adal eenbek - Adal tabys" on 15 March this year, El.kz cites primeminister.kz.
On the issue of repair and modernisation of the infrastructure of the housing and utilities sector, the President instructed to repair 55 operating heat sources and modernise at least 6,500 km of engineering networks. For these purposes, 650 billion tenge of investments will be attracted.
In order to solve the task of providing citizens with housing, the Government plans to quadruple the volume of commissioning of rental housing with the right to buy for those on the waiting list, including socially vulnerable segments of the population. An additional 272 billion tenge will be allocated for this purpose. On the instructions of the Head of State Otbasy Bank will launch a new preferential programme with the allocation of mortgage loans to the amount of 300 billion tenge. The new programme will be open to working youth, young families, recipients of housing payments, bank depositors, residents of single-industry towns, district centres and rural settlements, including those on waiting lists for housing without savings requirements. In the first year, the new programme is expected to provide additional housing for 12,000 families in need of housing. Overall, a record 18 million square metres of housing will be built this year, which is 2.5 million square metres more than previously planned annual figures.
As for the development of the country's road network. In order to cover the 12,000 kilometres of roads designated by the President, the Government has planned to repair and build 2,500 kilometres of road surface in addition to the current works. About 1 trillion tenge of investments will be allocated for these purposes. This will make it possible to increase the share of republican roads in good and satisfactory condition to 93 per cent, as well as to create 24,000 additional jobs.
In order to increase the level of gasification of settlements, the Head of State has set a task to modernise at least 1.7 thousand km of networks. This will ensure access of more than 300,000 citizens to blue fuel. In this regard, the Government will gasify 87 settlements this year instead of 46 planned. Thus, more than 63 thousand people will be provided with gas by accelerated measures, i.e. the coverage will be almost doubled. 195 billion tenge will be allocated for these purposes.
Prime Minister instructed to submit schedules of financing of projects with further daily control of their timely implementation by 1 April this year.
"We must ensure timely implementation of large-scale infrastructure initiatives of the President. I instruct each minister and akim, the management of national companies to monitor the work on a daily basis. Residents should feel real changes. Full return and result will be an indicator of our effectiveness," Olzhas Bektenov emphasised.
Along with this, the meeting considered measures for further development of manufacturing industry, transit corridors, entrepreneurship and IT-technologies. The priority task is new investment projects that create a multiplier effect in the form of new jobs, transfer of advanced technologies and competencies, localisation of large production facilities, creation of high value-added clusters and others.
- At least 70 planned projects will be commissioned this year. In order to develop the manufacturing industry, additional measures will also be developed to increase the load of domestic enterprises to an average of 65 per cent.
- In order to develop transit corridors and increase the volume of freight traffic by all types of transport, construction of new railways, logistics centres and warehouses will continue. Thus, it is planned to increase the volume of cargo transportation by rail to 450 million tonnes and by road to 316 million tonnes, as well as transit transportation to 30 million tonnes, including the volume of cargo transportation along the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route at the level of 4.2 million tonnes.
- The government will continue to support domestic business. An additional 240 billion tenge will be allocated for the development of the agro-industrial complex, and up to 320 billion tenge will be allocated to subsidise SME projects. To attract investors, the territories of 12 special economic and industrial zones will be provided with the necessary infrastructure. KZT 160bn will be allocated for these purposes. Also, the creation of 8 new small industrial zones for a total of 30 billion tenge will be accelerated through the mechanism of "industrial mortgage".
- In the sphere of information and communication services, growth is expected to be at least 10% and will be ensured, including by increasing exports of IT services to $600 million.