Kazakhstan President invited Ali Koç to invest

During the Strategic Cooperation Council meeting in Ankara last, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev stressed the need for improving trade ties between Turkey and Kazakhstan, noting that bilateral trade volume has begun to decline.

Trade between the two countries was $ 2.8 billion in 2008 and rose to $ 4.5 billion in 2014 but since then has fallen rapidly to around $1.9 billion, reaching its lowest point in a decade.

In addition to official talks in Ankara, Nazarbayev oversaw the signing of 22 different investment agreements totaling $1.7 billion, or about TRY 10.5 billion.

The number of jobs created by these agreements is expected to be around 3,000. For instance, Eksen Group will build a $300 million finance, tourism and business center in Kazakhstan’s former capital, Almaty. DAL Holding will establish a green- house facility with a $200 million investment to create 700 jobs.

In addition to these deals, Nazarbayev also accepted a delegation led by the Vice Chair- man of the Board of Directors of the Koc Group and the President of the Fenerbahce soccer club, Ali Koc. Information was exchanged about the areas of interest for Koc such as their activities in the defense sector.

Kazakhstan, the rising star of Central Asia, has received $300 billion in foreign direct investments over the last 25 years. Most of these were energy investments made from scratch. The amount of foreign investments made in the country last year alone was above $15 billion.

Kazakhstan is mainly under the radar of the United States, Europe and Far East countries. In that sense, Nazarbayev’s visit is an important step for Turkey to gain an early foothold in the Central Asian market.