kazakhstan in the future essay

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Kazakhstan’s Foreign Policy: A Role Model, from Past to Present

Dr. Mehmood Ul Hassan Khan has specialties in management, marketing, economics and governance. He has also master degree in Development with specialization in Diplomacy and Public Relations. He has also a rich experience in research, peace and conflict resolution and defence issues. His research and comprehensive articles have already been published in China, Uzbekistan, Iran, Turkey, Azerbaijan, USA, South Korea, UAE and Kuwait too.

He has great experience in the socio-economic, geo-politics and geo-strategic issues of Central Asia, Caucasus and Middle East. He is a famous expert on CIS and Caucasus in Pakistan. Member Board of Experts: CGSS, Islamabad. Ambassador at large at IHRFW.

The “Geneva of Asia”, Republic of Kazakhstan has a pragmatic, forward looking and progressive foreign policy which emphasizes to foster strong, sustainable alliances, meaningful partnerships, and trustworthy friendships based on mutual respect. Due to its visionary leadership it has many foreign policies and diplomatic accomplishments during the last thirty years.

Kazakhstan seems a kind of positive/soft state having rich natural resources, the world’s ninth largest country by area, and located in the very geographical center of Eurasia.

It does not have favourable geopolitical conditions and moreover its own position at the junction of the interests of global players, yet it confidently maintains domestic political stability, sustainable economic growth and constructive relations with all the main actors of the global power politics.

Kazakhstan, shares one of the longest land borders with two world powers, Russia and China, manages to successfully maneuver in the dark waters of world politics.

According to Kazakhstan’s official statistics (2019-2020) China second-largest trading partner of it. In this connection, bilateral trade reached $11 billion in 2018. China is also a major investor in Kazakhstan through its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Kazakhstan’s Khorgos Gateway, the biggest dry port in the world, was constructed by Chinese companies.

Kazakhstan has also maintained cordial bilateral relations with Russia since its inception. According to Kazakhstan’s official statistics (2019-2020) Russia is its largest trading partner, with an estimated $18 billion in 2018. President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev has very trustworthy relations with President Vladimir Putin.

In this context, security agreements provide a stable base for the Russian-Kazakh relationship as well as Kazakhstan’s membership to the Moscow-led Eurasian Economic Union. In January 2019, the two governments ratified a deal under which Kazakhstan will assemble Russian military helicopters. That same year, Kazakh troops participated in the Russian-led multinational exercise center 2019. But it has rejected Moscow’s offer to build a nuclear power plant in its territory which showed its independent foreign policy.

Since its independence, Kazakhstan has been a successful model of political stability, consistence democratization, social cohesion, and people’s friendly legislation and structural reforms which is based on the foreign policy strategy of H.E. Nursultan Nazarbayev, the First President of the country.

Nazarbayev, like Lee Kuan Yew in Singapore, is the real de facto architect of modern Kazakhstan. H.E. Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, Nazarbayev’s successor and the former Deputy Secretary General of the United Nations, succeeded in the presidential elections of 2019, and continued and consolidated uniqueness of its foreign policy and followed the line of his predecessor.

Kazakhstan’s foreign policy does not envision itself as a pawn on some Eurasian chessboard, but rather as an independent power with its own objectives and ambitions. Moreover, Kazakhstan is looking to increase its image and influence, in Central Asia and beyond.

The Republic of Kazakhstan managed risks of foreign policy through the balanced development orientations of external relations in all strategic areas. It followed a “multi-vector” principle, which remained doctrinal significance for Kazakhstani diplomacy.

It distinguishes Kazakhstan from other Central Asian Countries which has an ideal combination of consistency and flexibility in the implementation of this principle and it remained strong, stable and sustainable in all its important parameters of national sovereignty, territorial integrity, politicization and democratization, socio-economic prosperity, effective good governance and last but not least, human survival and productive channels.   

It has been a reasonable pragmatism and the rational decision making “not to put all eggs in one basket” which created strategic cushion to move forward in a peaceful manners. In this context, Kazakhstan has been applying the “multi-vector” model to almost all spheres of its international cooperation, engagements and dialogues since its inception. 

Kazakhstan protected all its vested interest of security through innovative diplomatic maneuvering and economic manipulation since 1991 and successfully surpassed all regional as well as international crises. Formation of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) was a deliberate strategic move to achieve element of diplomatic diversity and further sustainability among the regional main stakeholders. It has actually enhanced its regional connectivity and Out-Reach Policy (ORP) of South Asian Region.

Kazakhstan also followed Balancing Act Doctrine and has been an active participant in the NATO Partnership for Peace program, and maintains close cooperation with the United States, which, despite some kind of displeasure and discomfort in Moscow and Beijing, plays an important stabilizing role in the region from the point of view of Kazakhstan’s vested interests.

Kazakhstan has also friendly ties with USA. The U.S. former President Donald Trump and former Kazakhstan President Nazarbayev met in January 2018, a high-level meeting which was followed by another in September 2019 in New York between Presidents Trump and Tokayev. Regular official contacts with senior U.S. officials also occur through the C5+1 group comprised of the five Central Asian states and the U.S.

According to Kazakhstan’s official statistics (2019-2020) bilateral trade between Washington and Nur-Sultan reached $2.1 billion in 2018. This marked a new milestone in bilateral trade, which has generally increased in recent years; traffic of goods and services reached $1.3 billion in 2017.

Right from the beginning, Kazakhstan sought to expand the orbit of its interests, intentionally associating itself with a broader international agenda. In this connection, Kazakhstan initiated the idea of Conference on Interaction and Confidence-Building measures in Asia (CICA) the only international platform providing a stable dialogue on security issues in Asia as a whole. It enabled to identify its presence in European Union (EU) through the chairmanship of the OSCE in 2010 which further enhanced its pivotal role in the European security architecture especially energy security.

Kazakhstan and the European Union (EU) have signed a new trade agreement, the Enhanced Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (EPCA), which entered into force on March 1, 2020. According to the European Commission (2020) the EU is Kazakhstan’s biggest trade partner as a bloc, with almost 40 percent share in its total external trade. The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development has invested in Kazakhstan’s energy industry by building solar power facilities.

Kazakhstan consistently adopted and implemented the principle of economic pragmatism, which remained the main criteria for all strategic decisions for the last thirty years. Economy first, then politics”, remained dominating factor during former president Nazarbayev and is still the role model of incumbent government. This approach was development oriented which promoted economic stability and ultimately achieved its sustainability.

It blocked political radicalism within the country, but also in the external arena, in relations with strategic partners. Nevertheless gradual political reforms have been initiated which also created befitting business equity and political tranquility in the country. 

Kazakhstan’s engagement with the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), invariably emphasizes the purely economic nature of this organization. Thus Nazarbayev’s principled position in favor of economic pragmatism blocked all attempts to politicize the union.

Kazakhstan’s inclusion in the Turkic Council is another prime example of its economic and commercial diplomacy which has actually further diversified its regional as well as international relations.

Kazakhstan has been performing status of facilitator and mediator for the last thirty years. It hosted a round of the negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program back in 2013, and has hosted over a dozen rounds of talks intended to find a solution for the conflict in Syria under the flagship of the “Astana Peace Process (APP)”.

Moreover, its successful diplomatic efforts to reconcile Putin with Erdogan in 2016 became possible in particular because of special relations with Turkey which successfully averted an imminent diplomatic tussle and maintained peace in the region and beyond.  Nazarbayev’s personal trusting relationship with both leaders played a special role which defused widening political and diplomatic rift between two countries. In this regard, Kazakhstan’s spirit of classical old diplomacy played a decisive role.

Interestingly, Kazakhstan followed anti-crisis diplomacy due to which Kazakhstan was able to avoid the risk of being drawn into contradictions between world powers.

In this connection, the Russian-Georgian conflict of August 2008 somehow created a difficult situation for the multi-vector policy of the country. Refusing to openly accuse the Kremlin at the start of the conflict, Nazarbayev, at the same time, was able to withstand the pressure from Moscow to recognize South Ossetia’s independence was a “master stroke” of its foreign policy. Afterward, Kazakhstan actively supported the resolution calling “for preserving the territorial integrity of states.” at the SCO summit.

Kazakhstan’s peaceful persuasion of diversification energy policy in terms of supplies and production should be treated as a significant “balancing” step to begin exporting oil to the West through the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline which was aimed at partially reducing the dependence on the transport and communication systems of Russia.

Right from the beginning, Kazakhstani has been staunch supporter of conflict resolution and always seeks to independently create favorable external conditions.

Kazakhstan striving hard spirits developed spirits of rational decision making which secured its strategic interest and developed economic self-reliance and financial stability during the intensification in relations between the West and Russia, as well as deepening contradictions between the US and China, and resultantly it has created the Astana International Financial Center (AIFC). The establishment of AIFC has actually further enhanced inflows of FDIs, FPIs and joint ventures in the country and moreover, enabled it to enter in the Russian and Chinese financial markets.

Formation of the AIFC vividly reflects Kazakhstan’s ability to skillfully integrate itself into the dynamics of relations between different poles of power, effectively capitalizing its competitive advantages as a transit zone.

Kazakhstan has been following systematic efforts to integrate its foreign policy initiatives into the very center of international politics. Furthermore, this policy pursues a number of specific tasks, such as preventing a marginalization of Kazakhstan, as well as the inclusion of Central Asian region in the international arena.

Since its inception, Kazakhstan unilaterally rejected nuclear weapons arsenal. It is pertinent to mention that Kazakhstan possessed the 4th largest nuclear capability in the world, which was more than what China, the UK, and France had combined.

In this connection, its zero nuclear arsenal policy won the hearts and souls of all the regional as well as international power brokers. Voluntary rejection of Weapon of Mass Destruction (WMD) was the innovative move which has certain socio-economic, geopolitical and geostrategic dividends. It fostered its credibility in the West and among the international community in general.

Its rational thinking to abandon of nuclear potential has also secured numerous tangible dividends. Since 1991, Kazakhstan has attracted more than $300 billion of foreign direct investment, accounting for 75 percent of all investments in Central Asia as a whole.

Its visionary leadership created “Greater Eurasia” which was based on the unification of the Eurasian Economic Union, the Silk Road Economic Belt, and the European Union into a single mega-project. It was announced at the 70th session of the UN General Assembly in 2015.

The idea of Greater Eurasia (GE) triggered its regional connectivity and further consolidated its economic potential.  It opened a new window of opportunity for all the regional players to form befitting propositions in terms of economy, trade and commerce, investments, and commercial diplomacy. Finally it promoted the principle of “inseparable of security”.

Kazakhstan has been following proactive politics is now the best way to stay afloat, which makes it possible not to become a passive hostage of a steadily escalating rivalry between major powers. It tried to promote spirits of harmony, peace and stability.

Its Astana club created a new format for meetings of political and business elites. It is a unique forum where the most influential representatives of the USA, Russia, China, Iran, Turkey, and 30 other, mainly Eurasian, countries gather at the same table to resolve issues.

According to its Foreign Ministry (2019) Kazakhstan has established relations with Barbados and with all Latin American and Caribbean nations which vividly reflected its diversified, dynamic and constructive foreign policy.

It hopes that in the near future, the “Asian Vienna (Kazakhstan) might be of considerable interest, because of its ability to resolve contradictions along the USA-Russia, USA-China, USA-Iran lines. The visionary leadership of Kazakhstan and its rich and diversified diplomatic and mediating experience may turn out to be very valuable assets.

Kazakhstan is a member of many influential international organizations. It is active member of the United Nations (UN), the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA), the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) and last but not least, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO).

Since 2003, it has been arranging the Congresses of Leaders of World and Traditional Religions in its country, aiming to unit at one table the leaders of all leading world religious confessions.

Kazakhstan also chaired the Group of Landlocked Developing Countries, a 32 member state initiative under the umbrella of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development.

Furthermore, Kazakhstan remains the only Central Asian nation to have held a non-permanent seat in the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), for 2017-2018.

Kazakhstan took its participation in the UN to a new level when it deployed for the first time a company of 120 peacekeepers to the UN mission in Lebanon (UNIFIL) in October 2018 and a new contingent was sent in November 2019. No other Central Asian country has sent this amount of military personnel to UN peace missions.

Now President Tokayev has carried on the multi-vectored doctrine that First President Nursultan Nazarbayev implemented during his presidency. Both leaders believe that by enacting strong political and economic reforms, the country will be in a better position to build its relationships with other nations.

Kazakhstan is a neutral nation, which has worked hard to reform its military, political and economic policies as it advances toward a full democracy. The new concept of Kazakhstan’s foreign policy openly declares its intentions to secure the status of a “leading state” in the region.

On March 6, 2020, a presidential decree has approved the Republic of Kazakhstan’s Foreign Policy Concept for 2020-2030.

It highlights salient features of its system of fundamental views, i.e. the principles, goals, objectives, priorities, and mechanisms of the country’s foreign policy during the reference period.

In this context, Kazakhstan’s President Kassym-Zhomart Tokayev from the very beginning clearly emphasized the need to continue exercising the country’s endorsed political course, the foundations of which were laid by country’s first president Nursultan Nazarbayev.

It seems that the adoption of a new Foreign Policy Concept aimed at pursuing a multi-vector and well-balanced foreign policy . It is blue print for the new era. It is road map of further strengthening of bilateral relations and achieving of objectives of commercial diplomacy. It facilitates the associated main stakeholders to jointly work for the further development of the positive developments of Kazakhstan.

The new concept of foreign policy has some certain additions, variations and supplements which jointly shape its future recourse, formation of national narrative, development plans and above all specific priorities in diverse filed of economy, trade & commerce, investments, structural reforms, politicization and democratization, new social norms and devising of new comprehensive grand strategy to combat with all emerging state and non-state threats and crises.

It pinpoint strategic therapy to merging threats like climate change,     conflict between various international actors, including sanctions, erosion of the international law principles, increased extremism, terrorism, and the arms race, the intensification of hybrid, cyber, trade and currency wars, among others.

It affirms Kazakhstan imperative and advantageous position of an active and responsible international community participant and contributor to ensuring international and regional stability and security. It emphasizes to maintain friendly, predictable and mutually beneficial relations with foreign partners.

It seems that Kazakhstan is interested to remain distant and neutral in contradictions and conflicts of world power brokers. Therefore, a multi-vector and pragmatic foreign policy permits Kazakhstan to build relations with other countries and international organizations as per its vested interests and on an equal and constructive basis.

It chalks out new principles including helping build stable, fair and democratic world order, promoting the state’s external openness and the inextricable link between security and development in international relations. It urges an equitable integrative world to take care of global political, economic and humanitarian issues.

The new concept highlights the strategic importance of multiculturalism and aiming at establishing a collective vision and effective approaches for the international community to address a wide range of global and regional issues based on multilateral advisory and agreements.

It further consolidates the concept of the “Listening State” proposed by President Kassym-Zhomart Tokayev in his first Message to the people of Kazakhstan. It refers to creating a qualitatively new mechanism for ensuring a continuous dialogue between state and society, whereas the former gives a prompt and effective response to the needs of citizens.

It has certain economic dimensions which are development oriented and dynamic in its composition. It has further increase its constituent priorities, compared to the previous concept, from 9 to 14.

Previously Kazakhstan extended its investment cooperation with foreign partners through listing the economy sectors requiring foreign investment. These are mechanical engineering, appliance industry, agriculture, light manufacturing, healthcare, education, transport, tourism, etc. Thus, the activities of Kazakhstani diplomats are focused on promoting the non-raw-materials sectors of the country’s economy.

Figure-VIII

It is designed to promote the development of Kazakhstan’s transit and logistics potential, including the introduction of an “open skies” regime, the expansion of the range, volume and geographical destinations of national exports, dismantling various export barriers in foreign markets, as well as the promotion of institutions like the Astana International Financial Center, The Khorgos International Center for Cross-Border Cooperation and created jointly with Uzbekistan the “Central Asia” Center for Trade and Economic Cooperation.

It indicates a major change in Kazakhstan’s foreign policy priorities. Its perspective applies particularly to the country’s positioning in a regional context. In the previous concept, Kazakhstan presented itself as a country that recognizes its role and responsibility and strives for the development of intra-regional integration in Central Asia, now it openly declares its intentions to consolidate its status as a “leading state in the region which is indeed a paradigm shift in its outlook.  

According to new concept relations with other countries in the region have a strategic nature and relations with China, Russia, the United States and the European Union. It supports the expansion of multilateral dialogue and cooperation in Central Asia. Now it appears that Kazakhstan stands ready to help strengthen the existing interaction formats between the Central Asian countries and foreign partners.

Interestingly, Kazakhstan’s foreign policy priorities are now shifted from individual countries to regional and multilateral cooperation. In Asia, for instance, the emphasis is placed both on active participation in the work of the SCO, the Council of Interior Ministers, the OIC, the Cooperation Council of Turkic-speaking states, and on expanding ties with ASEAN, the League of the Arab States and other international organizations, where Kazakhstan is involved.

It fosters enhanced cooperation in the Caspian region in the field of energy, transport, environmental protection and security following adopted in the 2018 Convention on the Legal Status of the Caspian Sea. It also expresses an intention to continue close cooperation with the EAEU member state and to optimize negotiation approaches within the framework of the Union. It supports further strengthening of bilateral relations with Great Britain, which completed its exit from the European Union (Brexit) last year.

Being prominent regional expert of Kazakhstan & CIS I support salient features of new concept of foreign policy. It combines policy formulation with actuality of its implementation thus jump from cosmetic orientations to systematic approach to achieve the goals of further socio-economic prosperity, economic sustainability, continuation of structural reforms, further initiation of political, democratic, social, civil, administrative and judicial reforms under the gambit of pragmatic and progressive foreign policy.

Over the past 30 years Kazakhstan has established diplomatic relations with 186 countries and transformed into one of the dynamically economies of the region and world alike. It successfully nurtured its macro-economy with immaculate vision, policies, programs and integrative mechanism of balanced foreign policy since its inception.

Successive leadership of Kazakhstan followed a holistic foreign policy to make bridges of political consultation, social concession, geopolitical and geostrategic alignment which enabled it to sail through the regional triangle of China, Russia and Turkey to global super orbits of the USA and the EU to protect its vested interest.

Its inbuilt quality of crisis management under the umbrella of foreign policy has averted numerous crises of basic identity, sovereignty, territorial disintegration, economic meltdown, financial crunch, political instability and above all crises of alliance and conveniences. Its participation in the SCO, OIC, the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA), Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) and Turkic Council has further diversified its foreign policy.

Its superior, supportive and stimulating skills of “Conflict Resolution” have been role model for all the regional as well as international power brokers due to which it lessened escalations and promoted normalizations between the conflicting parties, prime examples may be nuclear negotiations about Iran, Syrian crisis and many others important political and diplomatic rifts in the near past between Turkey and Russia, Iran and the West and last but not least, disorder between Central Asian Countries.

Interestingly its multi-vector foreign policy stimulates people’s friendly policies. Its listening state policy is the outcome of its historic civilization, traditions and norms further enhances and institutionalizes spirits of e-government, accountability, good governance, social responsibility and last but not least political activation in the country.

Its new concept of foreign policy for 2020-2030 has now introduced new ways and means to foster socio-economic prosperity, political stability, democratic norms and social cohesion in the country. It has outlined new codes of glory and gratification. It has new priorities of economic growth, regional connectivity, global engagement and of course persuasion of leading role of Kazakhstan.    

Its new concept of foreign policy for 2020-2030 showcases its investment potential and prospects of joint ventures through befitting regional as well as international partnerships.        

To conclude the Republic of Kazakhstan has been pursuing its foreign policy on the basis, continuity of the former president policies, striving for building a stable, fair and democratic world order; equal integration into the global political, economic and humanitarian space; effective protection of the rights, freedoms and legitimate interests of Kazakh citizens and compatriots living abroad.

Moreover, Kazakhstan has been trying to promote the external openness of the state, the creation of favourable external conditions for increasing the welfare of Kazakh citizens, the development of the political, economic and spiritual potential of the country.

Kazakhstan’s multi-vector, pragmatic, progressive and proactive foreign policy stands for the development of friendly, equal and mutually beneficial relations with all countries, interstate associations and international organisations of practical interest to Kazakhstan.

Its foreign policy sustains multilateralism to create a collective vision and effective approaches of the international community to solving a wide range of global and regional problems on the basis of multilateral consultations and agreements.

Its foreign policy is the ideal combination of development and security which cares both at the national, regional and global levels. It involves the development of integrated approaches of the international community to respond to cross-border security challenges and threats, conflict resolution, peace building in post-conflict countries. 

Kazakhstan’s foreign policy strategy has strategic goals which include strengthening the independence, state sovereignty and territorial integrity of the country, maintaining the independence of its foreign policy. It cultivates consolidation of leading positions and promotion of long-term interests of Kazakhstan in the Central Asian region. It asserts its active and responsible role in the international community, making a significant contribution to ensuring international and regional stability and security.

It secures its friendly, predictable and mutually beneficial relations with foreign states in both bilateral and multilateral formats, the development of integrated cooperation with interstate associations and international organisations.

It supports its foreign policy potential in order to increase the competitiveness of the national economy, the level and quality of life of Kazakh citizens.

It assists in preserving and strengthening the unity of the multiethnic people of Kazakhstan through foreign policy methods and raising the practical interests of citizens of Kazakhstan and national business to the forefront of the state’s foreign policy.

Its new concept of foreign policy 2020-2030 guides the parameters to achieve its strategic goals through increasing efforts to form a politically stable, economically sustainable and secure space around Kazakhstan, continuation of the course on strengthening international peace and cooperation, increasing the effectiveness of global and regional security and interaction systems; the development and implementation of new approaches to key foreign policy issues at the bilateral and multilateral levels, taking into account the promotion and protection of the long-term strategic interests of the state; ensuring a new level of “economisation” of the foreign policy, further strengthening the position of Kazakhstan in the system of the global economic relations; realisation of “humanitarian diplomacy”, popularisation of a positive image of the country in the world community; establishing an effective system of communication with the public of Kazakhstan on foreign policy issues; improvement of work to ensure the protection of personal and family rights of citizens, the legitimate interests of individuals and legal entities of the Republic of Kazakhstan abroad.

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Future Prospects Of Kazakhstan: An On-the-Ground Report From Astana

July 12, 2023 Geopolitical Report ISSN 2785-2598 , Central Asia

Geopolitical Report ISSN 2785-2598 Volume 32 Issue 6 Authors: Silvia Boltuc

Despite the collapse of the Soviet Union, for most Europeans, Kazakhstan remains an unknown and unexplored land. It has a complex identity halfway between Asia and Europe. A past in the steppes, but with cities such as Astana projected towards the future.

Kazakhstan’s Soviet past is well known; ironically, the country remained the last piece of the Soviet Union for four days when even the area today known as the Russian Federation had left it on December 12 th , 1991.

Today, the winds of change are pushing towards a new direction that aims to challenge traditional elements of the past, such as the oligarchic system . 25% of Kazakhstan’s population is from a new generation, not inheriting the Soviet legacy, but making its own demands .

The government addressed these requests through a referendum in June 2022 and the parliamentary elections in March 2023. This event boosted the modernisation and democratisation process, creating the “just and fair Kazakhstan” sponsored by President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev.

The atmosphere in Astana was one of strong expectation regarding a long-awaited change. The referendum led to a constitutional reform which created a new model of Majilis (lower house of Parliament) and maslikhats (local legislative body) to guarantee voters’ national and regional interests and a variety of perspectives in representative power bodies.

The reforms, according to the Government, curbed the President’s authority, bolstered Parliament and human rights, and encouraged citizen involvement in politics.

Decolonisation and Adaption for the Future: Language Politics in Kazakhstan

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Driving down any street in Astana, Kazakhstan’s new, hyper-futuristic capital city, you may be surprised to note the total absence of any Russian-language signage. In fact, insofar as whoever is in charge of Kazakh road marking is concerned, English takes precedence over Russian, with Latin script transliterations of placenames sitting under the Kazakh Cyrillic. This comes in spite of the fact that, statistically, Russian is a ‘majority’ language of the country, with 95% of the population having proficiency as of 2009. On the contrary, Kazakh is spoken by approximately 83.1% of the nation , a lesser, but significant, majority. Having arrived in Astana just over a month ago, I was struck by the bifurcated nature of many of the conversations I was overhearing, with taxi drivers, shop workers, and people on the street shifting seamlessly between Kazakh and Russian. In the process of writing this piece, I interviewed around ten Kazakh speakers, across a wide range of age groups, to gain insight into their lived experience of the language.

The generational gulf in attitudes toward the Kazakh language in Kazakhstan was striking: older people tended to be more engaged with the significance of the language and its implications for the Kazakh identity, whereas younger people, born after the fall of the USSR, were more ambivalent – taking the prevalence of Kazakh as an accepted, intrinsic part of the only linguistic culture they have known. Furthermore, every Kazakh speaker interviewed unanimously positioned themselves against Russia, and spoke in almost exclusively negative terms concerning “Russianness”, the Russo-Ukrainian war, and perceived Russian colonial legacies in Kazakhstan. Whilst this small sample cannot accurately reflect the popular opinion of the whole Kazakh population,  these interviews nevertheless suggest a “decolonial” trend in Kazakh society since the outbreak of war in Ukraine

Historical Context:

Prior to the Russian conquest of Central Asia between 1835 and 1895, the Kazakh language was by and large oral, emerging from the Kipchak branch of Turkic languages, with the first Kazakh texts being written in Arabic script. Both Tsardom and the Soviet Union in turn systematically eroded the Kazakh language, with Stalinist collectivisation resulting in the starvation of approximately one third of the ethnic Kazakh population , alongside a campaign of Russification. Russian, in the Kazakh SSR, became a prestige language – the language of government, and a means of achieving social mobility and a steady career. In 1970, 42% of Kazakhs were fluent in Russian, already a dramatic increase on Russian’s total insignificance through the 1920s and 30s. But by the time of independence, 63% of ethnic Kazakhs spoke Russian , with 30% of this figure having Russian as their sole language. It is pertinent to note that Kazakh-Russian bilingualism was almost entirely unreciprocated on the part of Kazakhstan’s ethnically Russian population throughout the Soviet era. 

With this in mind, it is unsurprising to observe some of the Kazakh government’s post-independence policy concerning language. In September 1989, two years prior to independence, Kazakh gained state language status. In the years following, various pieces of legislation have made inroads toward increasing its uptake. For example, as recently as October, a bill has been drafted to increase Kazakh language output in state media from 50% to 70%.

The Kazakh Language as Decolonisation: 

As such, the use of the Kazakh language has a fundamentally decolonial function. The war in Ukraine and the Kazakh state’s subsequent commitment to sanctions against the Russian Federation has renewed the importance of these language policies. The current drafted plans to entirely do away with Cyrillic script for Kazakh by 2025 is a definitive slight against the Russians, a rally against an alphabet imposed upon them by an imperial power for little more than political convenience. The primacy of Russian arguably serves as a legacy of Russian and Soviet imperialism and therefore enables the Russian state to exercise soft power over its former territories. Speakers of Kazakh, particularly the older generation, are keen to emphasise this, with one interviewee declaring that “the Russians humiliate us through language”, accenting a culture of embarrassment about the notion that the Kazakh state has essentially sleepwalked into a situation whereby their native language has been replaced by a colonial one in the space of one hundred years. The same interviewee, who grew up in Shymkent and spoke Kazakh at home, discussed the importance of ensuring her children’s competence in the language – “it connects us with our heritage, which, in our culture, is incredibly significant”. 

Speaking with younger Kazakhs, it was somewhat predictable to observe their ambivalence on the issue. Many of whom take the speaking of Kazakh as a given, having only known an independent Kazakh Republic; one interviewee, Munira, declared “I don’t think about it at all”. 

What was particularly notable across nearly all of the people interviewed for the purposes of this article, was a keenness to practice and speak English. Nursultan Nazarbayev, the founding father of the independent Kazakh Republic, declared Kazakhstan a ‘trilingual nation’, with the English language comprising the third point of the triangle. English, in the Kazakh consciousness, particularly among the younger generation is, for want of a better word, cool. American television, western pop music, and imported designer clothes are very much in vogue. While many interviewees struggled to articulate the reasons for this, one statement to the effect that, “English is a road to better careers for us, and with that comes English lifestyles” provides an astute explanation. From a linguistic standpoint, it was fascinating to observe in my own conversations the ease with which Kazakh youths switched codes from Russian to Kazakh to English.

Kazakhstan is a relatively young nation and one whose consolidation of identity is fundamentally intertwined with its language. While Russian, in the words of Nursultan Nazarbayev, “ enabled Kazakhs to access the great literature ”, it simultaneously eroded indigenous Kazakh. Ironically, the Putin regime has been the biggest, albeit inadvertent, catalyst for the use of Kazakh, with the Russo-Ukrainian war triggering a resurgent interest, and pushing the need for derussification to the fore. Nevertheless, a political cognitive dissonance between Kazakh state language policy and economic policy pertaining to the Russian Federation persists: as recently as the start of October 2023 the Kazakh government signed a strategic cooperation deal with Gazprom . Ultimately, the continued growth of the Kazakh language and its consolidation among the younger generation must be fostered and encouraged, for the sake of a future beyond imperial hangovers. 

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Education in kazakhstan.

Sidiqa AllahMorad, Knowledge Analysis Manager, WES, Chris Mackie, Editor, WENR

Kazakhstan is a country in transition. Since 1991, when it became the last of the former Soviet republics to declare independence, its leaders have sought to transform the country’s economy, release it from the grip of central planners, and open it to market forces. Kazakhstan’s leaders have also sought to similar transformations elsewhere, at least nominally. Government officials have proclaimed a desire to decentralize political power, to reverse decades of international isolation, and to unify an independent, autonomous nation that for more than half a century had been tightly integrated into the Soviet Union.

But, as the length of that still-incomplete transition suggests, their success has been mixed. At times, continuity has held the upper hand over change, and lasting imprints of the country’s Soviet past still mark the land and its people. Despite ambitious restoration efforts , the Aral Sea , once the world’s fourth-largest lake, has shrunk to a 10 th of its previous size after decades of Soviet riverine diversions for irrigation and hydropower projects. Russian, the language of politics, commerce, and education in the Soviet Union, also remains the most widely spoken language in Kazakhstan, although reform efforts aimed at promoting the Kazakh language have achieved considerable success.

This transition has not spared Kazakhstan’s education system. Since independence, the government has embraced educational reforms aimed at opening education provision to the free market, decentralizing administrative oversight and accountability, integrating the education system more closely with the international community, and leveraging education to unify the nation. In recent years, given the country’s economic and political ambitions, the rush to transform the education system has only intensified.

But, as in other sectors, progress has been far from steady. In a syncopated series of advances and retreats, government officials have announced ambitious reforms, only to quickly walk them back. The basis for these reforms, as well as that of so much else in contemporary Kazakhstan, can ultimately be found in the turmoil of the country’s immediate post-independence social, political, and economic experience.

Post-Independence: A Decade of Change and Continuity

The dissolution of the Soviet Union sent shockwaves through every corner of Kazakhstani society, triggering outbreaks of long-forgotten diseases , fears of violent political unrest, and a mass exodus of ethnic minorities. The country’s economy was hit particularly hard. A constituent republic of the Soviet Union since 1920, the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic (Kazakh SSR), as it was known from 1936 to 1991, was of all the former Soviet republics one of the most closely tied to the metropole . Its economy had long depended on the seamless transportation of natural resources pulled from its rich soils and taken to other Soviet republics for processing.

As these now post-Soviet states introduced new tariffs and customs, disrupting the country’s long-established supply chains, Kazakhstan’s economy crashed. Between 1990 and 1995 the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) fell by 31 percent . 1  Hyperinflation ran rampant, reaching nearly 3,000 percent in 1992, as the government lifted price controls and expanded the money supply to cover large budget deficits. Growth remained sluggish until 1999, hindered as it was by low oil prices and a severe economic decline in Russia, still Kazakhstan’s largest trading partner , culminating in the 1998 Russian financial crisis.

The dissolution also caused immense social dislocation. Over 1.7 million ethnic Russians and more than half a million, or nearly two-thirds, of ethnic Germans left the country between 1989 and 1999. At the same time, the birthrate of those remaining plummeted, causing the size of the population to contract by more than 9 percent between 1991 and 2001, when it reached 14.9 million. These losses compounded the country’s economic troubles. The loss of large numbers of Russians and Germans, a disproportionate number of whom had previously held skilled positions in the Kazakh SSR’s government and largest industries, left a gaping hole in the country’s labor supply.

These early social and economic troubles were influential in shaping the earliest phase of the nation’s independence. Combined with a loss of subsidies from Moscow and disruptions to tax collection mechanisms, the faltering economy sharply reduced government revenue, leading to a rapid deterioration in the quality of public services. The collapse also forced the government to consider drastic economic reforms, which it laid out explicitly in the Kazakhstan 2030 Strategy . Adopted in 1997, this strategy prioritized reducing government interference in domestic and foreign trade, improving tax and tariff administration, revising corporate governance structures, encouraging foreign investment and international ties, and privatizing state-owned enterprises.

The push to privatize public enterprises had a particularly consequential impact on the future of the country and its education system. In the 1990s, it prompted a fire sale of state assets. Foreign investors, hoping to capitalize on bargain prices for a stake in Kazakhstan’s rich oil fields, descended on the country. By 1999, nearly half of all medium-size and two-thirds of all large state enterprises had been sold off, according to the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development’s (EBRD’s) 1999 Transition Report .

Although nowhere near as thorough as it was in other sectors of the economy, this privatization drive extended to education as well. The 1990s witnessed a rapid expansion of private academic institutions, many of which, as time proved, were of very poor quality. Although most public schools and universities remained under tight government control, legislation issued shortly after independence introduced tuition fees at public universities.

While international financial institutions praised Kazakhstan’s leaders for their enthusiastic embrace of privatization, other observers were more skeptical. In 1999, Transparency International ranked Kazakhstan in the bottom quintile of its Corruption Perceptions Index . In the years that followed, news reports exposed the dark underbelly of Kazakhstan’s free market reforms, revealing a world of backroom deals and widespread kickbacks extending to the highest levels of government. In 2003, two businessmen from the United States , one a former Mobil Oil Corporation executive, were charged in connection with $78 million in bribes to secure oil contracts. The bribes were paid to two high-level Kazakhstani officials : the former prime minister, Nurlan Balgimbaev, and Kazakhstan’s president, Nursultan Nazarbayev.

While Kazakhstan’s post-independence economic transformation was rapid and disruptive, its political system was characterized by far more continuity. Nazarbayev, who had for years served as the prime minister of the Kazakh SSR and chairman of its Communist Party, transitioned smoothly into the newly independent country’s top post as president. Although ostensibly running the country as a democracy, once in power Nazarbayev quickly cracked down on any political opposition, winning multiple elections with more than 95 percent of the vote. Surprisingly, international election monitors have criticized every election since independence as unfree and coerced. Nazarbayev also quickly moved to centralize power in the Office of the President, keeping a tight grip on all levels of government. It remains to be seen what impact Nazarbayev’s resignation in 2019 will have on democratic processes. Despite resigning, Nazarbayev remains the chairman of the country’s most powerful military institution and the leader of its dominant political party.

These events had a formative influence on the course of Kazakhstan’s later history, and on its education system in particular. Although conditions in the new millennium changed dramatically, the turmoil of these early years continue to shape the country to this day.

The New Millennium: Kazakhstan’s Uncertain Future

Kazakhstan’s experience in the twenty-first century differs markedly from that of the last decade of the twentieth. In 1999, Kazakhstan’s economy entered a new phase of rapid expansion, spurred by the devaluation of the tenge , Kazakhstan’s currency, and the start of a nearly decadelong period in which the global price of crude oil increased more than 10-fold. In 2006, after more than half a decade during which annual GDP growth rates hovered at around 10 percent, Kazakhstan’s economy—which had only recently seemed on the verge of collapse—earned it a spot among the world’s upper-middle income countries . With some notable exceptions, growth has remained solid since.

These improvements have padded government coffers and sparked ambitious development plans. In late 2012, President Nazarbayev unveiled the Kazakhstan 2050 Strategy , an ambitious state plan aimed at making Kazakhstan one of the world’s 30 most developed countries by the middle of this century.

The booming oil economy also drove up demand for professionals with the education and skills to work in the new enterprises. Even today, despite rapid growth in education participation rates, companies still report widespread skills shortages. In 2017, Kazakhstani executives listed an “inadequately educated workforce” as one of the top three obstacles to doing business in the country, after access to financing and corruption. Low unemployment rates back up these concerns. In 2019, unemployment among youths between the ages of 15 and 24 stood at just 3.7 percent, well below the average (12.4 percent) among Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) member states. 2  It was even lower for highly educated workers. Unemployment among those with at least a bachelor’s degree or a short-cycle tertiary education was just 3.5 percent in 2017 , compared with 5.3 percent among those with an upper secondary education and 6.7 percent of those with an elementary or lower secondary education.

Despite the country’s dramatic economic turnaround, troubles remain. For one, the benefits of growth have not always been evenly distributed. Situated almost entirely in Central Asia, although a Western sliver of land extends past the Ural River into Europe, Kazakhstan is the largest landlocked country and, by land mass, the ninth-largest country in the world. Compared with its size, the country’s population is small, just 18.8 million in 2020 , giving it a population density of just 17 people per square mile , among the lowest in the world. Kazakhstan’s population is also very unevenly distributed, with a fifth of the population tightly packed into just three cities. Public services and employment opportunities are similarly concentrated in urban areas, resulting in large economic and social disparities between urban and rural communities.

The nature of Kazakhstan’s economic growth—which has largely been driven by its natural wealth—also presents challenges. With oil and related products accounting for nearly three-quarters of the value of Kazakhstan’s exports, rapid and disruptive swings have long plagued the country’s economy, as periodic demand shocks upend the global price of oil. For example, just a few years after the Kazakhstan 2050 Strategy was announced, global overproduction of oil and falling demand caused global oil prices —and Kazakhstan’s economic output—to plummet. Annual GDP growth fell from 4.2 percent in 2014 to just a little more than 1 percent in 2015 and 2016.

The dangers of overdependence on petroleum exports have given new urgency to the government’s ongoing economic diversification efforts. Already in the Kazakhstan 2050 Strategy, the government had pledged to make its economy more diversified and knowledge based . Much of that will be driven by education reforms. The strategy prioritizes “ supporting youth, education, and innovative research ,” and calls for the creation of “an education system that promotes the growth of the nation.”

These reforms will build on those of the past. Since the start of the twenty-first century, growing revenues have allowed the government to devise ambitious reforms aimed at improving education and teaching quality, expanding access to poorer students, and aligning the system with international norms. But to fully transform and diversify its economy, the country will need to provide more support to its education system. In its latest report on the progress of Kazakhstan’s transition to a market economy, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) identifies the need to “improve inclusion across regions and for vulnerable population groups” as one of the country’s key priorities in 2021. In elaborating on how those improvements can be achieved, the report is unequivocal: “Reforms in education and vocational education need to accelerate.”

International Student Mobility

Recent developments in Kazakhstan have placed a premium on global awareness and engagement. In response, the government has attempted to cultivate international educational connections by promoting international student mobility, both into and out of Kazakhstan, and encouraging the internationalization of its higher education system.

In its Academic Mobility Strategy in Kazakhstan 2012-2020 , the primary policy document governing the country’s internationalization strategy over the past decade, the government laid out a series of bold internationalization goals. These included having one in five Kazakhstani students engage in some form of study abroad by 2020, and increasing the number of international students studying at Kazakhstani universities by 20 percent each year. Improving the English language skills of students and faculty, expanding the number of programs offered in foreign languages, and promoting links with foreign universities and international organizations were also identified as objectives in the strategy.

The government has backed these plans with concrete actions. It has funded generous international scholarship programs, issued directives requiring institutions to establish international academic partnerships, and joined intergovernmental higher education initiatives, most notably, those associated with the Bologna Process.

The Bologna Process

Kazakhstan’s gradual implementation of the principles underlining the Bologna Accord, which Kazakhstan joined as a full member in 2010 , has had a significant impact on international student mobility. The government has moved to harmonize its education system with those of other members of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA), introducing a three-cycle (bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral) qualifications structure and encouraging universities to adopt the European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System (ECTS), both of which are discussed in more detail below. These changes have increased intraregional credential recognition and portability, promoting student mobility between Kazakhstan and other EHEA member states.

Kazakhstan’s joining of the Bologna Process has also helped spur the proliferation of international academic and institutional partnerships, an explicit goal of the government, which now requires all universities to establish international partnerships. By the 2020/21 academic year , Kazakhstani universities had signed nearly 6,800 agreements with international partners in 85 countries. The vast majority of these agreements were signed with institutions in other EHEA member states.

Aside from increasing student and scholar mobility, the government hopes that these collaborations will help improve the knowledge and skills of domestic faculty and modernize academic courses and programs. Also helping to further these goals are a growing number of transnational education (TNE) programs, most notably joint and dual degree programs, which allow students to complete part of their studies at a Kazakhstani university and part at an international partner institution. In 2020/21, Kazakhstani universities offered 108 double degree or joint education programs with international partner institutions.

The Bolashak International Scholarship

The government of Kazakhstan also relies on publicly funded scholarships to help further its internationalization goals. Since 1993, the most important has been the Bolashak International Scholarship , which the British Council described as the “ best scholarship program in the world ” at its 2014 Going Global Conference.

The government’s goal for the program is partially revealed by its name, “Bolashak,” which translates into English as “future.” The presidential decree establishing the scholarship states that “Kazakhstan’s transition towards market economy and expansion of international contacts requires personnel with the advanced western education, and it is now necessary to send the most talented youth to study at the top-ranking universities abroad.”

The Bolashak scholarship aims at developing specialists in fields of public importance by funding the education of top students at prestigious overseas universities on the condition that they return to Kazakhstan and work for a minimum of five years after graduation. In exchange, the government pays for the full cost of their overseas studies, covering everything from tuition and books to travel, housing, and other living expenses. The scholarship also funds pre-degree English language training, professional internships, and non-degree training programs in critical fields. Between 1993 and 2017, the government awarded nearly 13,000 Bolashak scholarships .

The scholarship is administered by the JSC Center for International Programs , part of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan (MESRK). Eligibility criteria have varied widely over the course of the scholarship’s existence. Since 2011 , the scholarship has only funded post-graduate degree programs. In 2014, the center further restricted eligibility by increasing the minimum qualifying International English Language Testing System (IELTS) score and limiting the scholarship to students accepted at universities ranked in the top 200 on the QS World University Rankings , the Times Higher Education World University Rankings , or the Academic Ranking of World Universities .

In collaboration with student representatives, universities, and employers, the JSC Center also determines the specialties that are eligible for scholarship funding. Published data suggest that most Bolashak recipients pursue programs in fields important to the government’s social, economic, and political goals, such as information technology, oil and gas development, pedagogy, petrochemicals, political science, and public administration.

Outbound Mobility

But government funding alone is not solely responsible for the large number of Kazakhstani students studying overseas each year. In 2014, experts estimated that government scholarships funded the studies of only 30 percent of all Kazakhstani students enrolled abroad. The remainder were likely paying out of pocket, a possibility open to growing numbers of Kazakhstani students and their families as the country’s economy and middle class expand.

Those able to afford an international education are likely further pushed to study abroad by a lack of seats at high-quality domestic institutions and by the reports of corruption that have plagued Kazakhstan’s higher education system for decades. The promise of a higher quality education overseas likely attracts a significant proportion of Kazakhstani students who would have otherwise remained at home. In fact, few Kazakhstani international students remain overseas after graduation. Education agents working in Kazakhstan estimate that around seven in ten Kazakhstani students return home immediately after completing their studies.

This combination of factors has made Kazakhstan a major source of international students worldwide. In 2018, Kazakhstan was the eighth-largest source of international degree-seeking students globally, according to data compiled by the UNESCO Institute of Statistics (UIS). 3  That year, 83,503 Kazakhstani students were studying outside the country. Growth over the past decade has also been particularly impressive. Since 2009, outbound mobility has more than doubled, peaking at 90,213 in 2016 before declining slightly over the past two years.

Still, although many Kazakhstani students are willing to cross the country’s borders to study, most stop immediately on the other side. The vast majority of outbound Kazakhstani students are enrolled in countries directly bordering Kazakhstan, most notably Russia and China. Combining UIS data with the latest numbers provided by China’s Ministry of Education suggests that more than eight in ten international Kazakhstani students were enrolled in one of those two countries. 4

Russia and China

Kazakhstan has long been the leading source of international students in Russia. In 2017, the latest year for which the relevant UIS data is available, Russia hosted 65,237 Kazakhstani students, more than triple the number of Uzbek students (20,862), who make up the next largest contingent of international students in Russia.

Unsurprisingly, the educational connection between Kazakhstan and Russia has a long history. For decades, the government of the Soviet Union supported a unique system of international education and exchange, providing full funding to certain students from constituent republics to study at academic institutions in other Soviet republics, most often in the Russian Federation. After its dissolution, the connection between former Soviet republics continued. In 1998 , Kazakhstan signed a joint agreement with Belarus, the Kyrgyz Republic, and Russia (Tajikistan joined in 2002 ) that aimed at deepening “multilateral cooperation in the fields of education, sciences and cultures” and “setting standards of mutual recognition of education documents, academic degrees and ranks.”

Kazakhstan also cooperates closely with Russia politically, militarily , and economically. Kazakhstan, alongside Belarus and Russia, was a founding member of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), an integrative alliance that seeks to promote the free movement of goods and services between a number of East European, Western Asian, and Central Asian countries. The Russian government has also made attracting international students a linchpin of its “soft power” offensive in former Soviet republics, offering scholarships to talented Kazakhstani students , waiving student visa requirements , and allowing applicants to substitute a “ tailor-made ” university entrance examination for Russia’s national university admissions examination, the Unified State Exam. In late 2020, Russia also eased rules regulating international students’ eligibility to work in the country while studying.

Russian institutions also play a prominent part in transnational education (TNE) in Kazakhstan. In the 2020/21 academic year, Russian universities accounted for a third of all international agreements signed by Kazakhstani universities, the highest of any country by far. Although data are unavailable, these collaborative programs likely funnel Kazakhstani students to colleges and universities located in Russia. Other factors, including geographic proximity, cultural and linguistic similarity (more Kazakhstani citizens speak Russian than Kazakh), and the ready availability of affordable and high-quality institutions, likely also attract Kazakhstani students to Russia.

China is also an increasingly prominent destination for Kazakhstani students, although available numbers are not strictly comparable. According to the Institute of International Education’s (IIE’s) Project Atlas , the number of Kazakhstani students studying in China more than doubled in the decade prior to the 2015/16 academic year, growing from 5,666 in 2006/07 to 13,996 in 2015/16, before declining to 11,784 in 2017/18.

China’s continued growth as an international student destination has been bolstered by quality improvements at the nation’s universities and by ambitious government-funded projects, including the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), an abbreviation of the project’s official name: the Silk Road Economic Belt and 21 st -Century Maritime Silk Road. Given Kazakhstan’s prominent location on the ancient Silk Road, it is perhaps unsurprising that the Chinese government has directed some of its outreach toward the country, funding the establishment of Confucius Institutes in Kazakhstan and financing scholarships for Kazakhstani students to study in China.

The United States and Canada

Kazakhstani enrollments in the Western Hemisphere lag sharply behind those in the East. In the United States, they also show few signs of growth. After more than tripling between 2004/05 and 2009/10, when it reached 1,936, enrollment has barely budged since. Just 2,091 Kazakhstani students were enrolled in U.S. higher education institutions in the 2019/20 academic year, according to IIE’s Open Doors report . A plurality (44 percent) of these students are currently enrolled at the undergraduate level , with 35 percent registered in graduate programs, 8 percent in non-degree programs, and 13 percent in the Optional Practical Training (OPT) program.

Several reasons likely account for these low numbers, including an abundance of high-quality universities located closer to home, the high cost of colleges and universities in the U.S., and the generally low levels of English proficiency among Kazakhstani students. Despite a strenuous government effort to promote English language competence, introduced by President Nazarbayev in the 2007 Trinity of Languages program, overall English language proficiency in Kazakhstan remains low. The EF English Proficiency Index (EPI) has ranked Kazakhstan in the lowest English proficiency band every year since 2011. Education agents working in Kazakhstan confirm these assessments, reporting that most Kazakhstani students have weak English language skills and usually require preparatory English training before beginning their full-time studies.

Despite the two countries’ sharing many of the same challenges, Canada’s experience differs sharply from that of the U.S. While still low compared with Kazakhstani enrollments in Russia and China, enrollment in Canada has grown steadily after reaching a nadir of just 45 Kazakhstani students in 2004. According to statistics from Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) , enrollment growth has averaged more than 9 percent a year over the past decade, reaching 1,195 in 2019. This trend is hardly unique to Kazakhstani enrollments: Canada’s high-quality and relatively low-cost institutions as well as the country’s more welcoming policies toward both international students and internationally educated immigrants have been attracting growing numbers of students from around the world for years.

Inbound Mobility

For decades, Kazakhstan attracted relatively few international students. Developing its native-born workforce was long the government’s primary reason for promoting internationalization, so it naturally placed far less emphasis on increasing inbound student mobility than it did on boosting outbound flows.

The poor reputation of Kazakhstan’s higher education system also did little to attract international students. A 2017 review by the OECD of Kazakhstan’s higher education system identified a handful of factors discouraging international students from studying in the country, including the generally poor condition of Kazakhstan’s university facilities and services, widespread corruption, and a lack of programs offered in English. 5  The OECD report concludes that, “While it may be possible to increase inbound student numbers by working more closely with aid agencies, until the quality and integrity of higher education are demonstrably improved, substantial increases are unlikely.” As a result, Kazakhstan’s average inbound mobility ratio between 2010 and 2018 stood at just 1.6 percent, well below the world average (2.2 percent), according to UIS data .

But over the past two years, this picture has changed dramatically. Between 2018 and 2020, the number of international students enrolled in Kazakhstan expanded sharply, growing 184 percent, from 14,332 in 2018 to 40,742 in 2020 . In 2019, its inbound mobility ratio rose to 3.32 percent, an all-time high.

This transformation coincided with a renewed push by the government to attract international students. In early 2018, MESRK announced its plans to transform the country into a “Central Asian educational hub,” setting an ambitious goal of attracting 50,000 international students by 2022.

Data suggest that MESRK’s focus on Central Asia has paid off. Kazakhstan attracts more international students from around the world than any other country in Central Asia. Students from other Central Asian countries also make up the majority of all international students in Kazakhstan. In fact, most of the recent uptick in international students studying in Kazakhstan was driven by an increase in enrollments from Uzbekistan. Between 2018 and 2020 alone, the number of Uzbek students in Kazakhstan grew nearly sevenfold, rising from 3,768 in 2018 to 26,130 in 2020 .

But there are signs that that rapid expansion could prove short-lived. Recently, Uzbekistan has introduced important reforms to its own higher education system, significantly expanding the number of seats and public grants available at the country’s long overcrowded universities. More controversially, government officials have publicly encouraged Uzbek students enrolled abroad to return home , even going so far as to exempt returning students from national university entrance examinations. While it remains to be seen exactly what impact these changes will have on Kazakhstan’s inbound student numbers, early reports suggest that it could be severe.

Outside of Central Asia, India is a significant source of international students in Kazakhstan. Over the past five years, Indian student enrollment has grown by 159 percent, rising from 1,716 in 2016 to 4,453 in 2020. Much of that growth is driven by the demand of Indian students for a medical education, which in India is expensive and hard to access. Even if India’s recent medical reforms manage to increase the country’s ability to train its own medical students, growing political, economic, and cultural cooperation between Kazakhstan and India bode well for the future.

Kazakhstan’s growing popularity lends credence to some of the more optimistic projections of the country’s future role in international student mobility. In a 2012 paper , Geoffrey David Wilmoth, director of the education consulting firm Learning Cities International , argues that Kazakhstan is well poised to transform itself into an international education hub if it can successfully reform its higher education system.

In Brief: The Education System of Kazakhstan

Like the country as a whole, education in Kazakhstan is in transition. Despite decades of government efforts aimed at modernizing and internationalizing the education system, the imprint of its Soviet past remains prominent.

Much of that inheritance is positive. During the Soviet era, the state invested heavily in education, establishing a solid network of kindergarten, elementary, and secondary schools. As a result, literacy and enrollment rates skyrocketed—in 1990, one year before independence, the Kazakh SSR’s elementary gross enrollment ratio stood at 116 percent. The Soviet state also did much to develop higher education in the republic, leaving Kazakhstan 55 universities upon independence.

Still, Soviet-era education had significant shortcomings. Although overall enrollment rates expanded rapidly, access for many rural Kazakhstanis, especially to secondary and post-secondary education, remained limited. At the country’s universities, rigid teaching practices, a narrow focus on developing technical skills, and limited research capacity hampered quality. Strong centralized control over all levels of the education system also made it difficult for educators and administrators to adapt their practices to local conditions or changing circumstances. Finally, upon independence, Kazakhstan’s Soviet past left its education system isolated internationally, as the unique structure of Soviet qualifications diverged sharply from international, or at least Western, standards.

The turmoil of Kazakhstan’s first decade of independence added significantly to the challenges its education system faced. With the economy and public revenues collapsing, the government moved quickly to shift the responsibility for education funding from the public purse to private pockets, rushing through measures to privatize the ownership and financing of education. As a result, low-quality private institutions proliferated. Between 1995, the first year for which data are available, and 2004, government funding for education as a percentage of GDP collapsed, falling from 4.03 percent to 2.26 percent.

These initial disruptions had varying effects on different levels of the education system. Some, such as pre-elementary and technical and vocational education, were hit hard—institutions rapidly shuttered and enrollment dropped sharply. Other levels were impacted far less, at least in the short term. Starting in the early 2000s, the effects of the demographic contraction of Kazakhstan’s first decade of independence led to declining enrollments across the board.

The early 2000s also brought with them a dramatic change in the fortunes of Kazakhstan’s education system. Growing oil wealth expanded the government’s reform capacity, allowing it to embark on a series of sweeping education reforms. With varying levels of success, the government introduced measures aimed at aligning the country’s qualifications framework with EHEA standards and extending the elementary and secondary school cycle to 12 years. With respect to higher education, government officials adopted an “optimization policy” geared toward eliminating the low-quality institutions established since independence.

The results have been impressive. In 2011, Kazakhstan was ranked first worldwide on UNESCO’s Education for All Development Index (EDI), which measures elementary enrollment and completion rates, adult literacy levels, and gender parity in education and literacy. Today, enrollment in elementary and secondary education is nearly universal, with negligible differences in access and achievement by gender. International organizations, such as the OECD , have also praised the Kazakhstani education system for its low repetition rates. Most Kazakhstani students progress smoothly from one grade to the next, with few held back.

But education in the republic still faces significant challenges. Kazakhstani students perform poorly on international standardized assessments, and the country’s high EDI ranking belies large regional and socioeconomic disparities in educational access and achievement. These challenges are exacerbated by low levels of government support for education. Despite the economy’s rapid growth, education funding remains low, reaching just 2.6 percent of GDP in 2018, well below the OECD average (around 5 percent), leaving school infrastructure in much of the country inadequate and underdeveloped. And despite recent changes, the country’s highly centralized system of administration and governance has long challenged Kazakhstan’s educators and reformers.

Administration of the Education System

Kazakhstan is a unitary republic comprising 18 principal administrative divisions: 14 regions ( oblyslar in Kazakh and oblasts in Russian) and four special status cities 6  which possess the same degree of administrative and political autonomy as the oblyslar that surround them. Oblyslar are divided into more than 170 districts, or rayons , which are further subdivided into thousands of villages and rural communities. Despite the recent introduction of decentralization reforms , Kazakhstan’s central government retains tight control over regional and local authorities, with the president appointing regional governors (akims) , the highest regional executive officers, to lead oblyslar and special status cities.

Governance of the education system is similarly centralized. Presidential orders, acts of parliament, and ministerial decrees issued from the nation’s capital tightly regulate all levels of the country’s education system. The 2007 law On Education , plus its 2011 and 2015 amendments, defines the current legal framework governing education in Kazakhstan. Education delivered throughout the country must conform to the law’s decrees.

Since independence, the Executive Office of the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan and the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan (MESRK) have assumed primary responsibility for education administration. The Office of the President develops high-level education objectives and manages major projects, spearheading special initiatives like the Nazarbayev Intellectual Schools (NIS) and Nazarbayev University, discussed in more detail below. The president also plays an important role in developing the nation’s education policies, which are laid out in comprehensive state programs. Over the past decade, two state programs have been particularly decisive: the State Programme of Education Development in the Republic of Kazakhstan for 2011-2020 (SPED 2011-2020) and the State Programme of Education Development in the Republic of Kazakhstan for 2016-2019 (SPED 2016-2019).

MESRK’s responsibilities are more wide-ranging, including funding and management of the entire education system as well as its strategic planning. As the nation’s central education authority, MESRK also assumes primary responsibility for ensuring that the education laws and state education programs are implemented throughout the country.

In addition, MESRK regulates course content and program design. At all levels of education, from preschool to higher education, both public and private institutions are required to follow the standards and curriculum guidelines outlined in State Compulsory Standards 7  (SCS). Developed by the National Academy of Education (NAE), an agency of MESRK, SCS prescribe compulsory subjects , teaching methods, and educational programs. The latest SCS— updated in 2017 —seeks to address criticism leveled by, among others, the OECD in its 2018 Education Policy Outlook , that previous curricula focused too much on rote memorization, by instead emphasizing competencies, such as “critical thinking and creativity.”

While MESRK has historically played an important role in curriculum development at the higher education level, since Kazakhstan joined the Bologna Process, it has begun to concede more and more control over content and courses to accredited institutions. As of 2015, higher education institutions were able to determine 55 percent of program content in bachelor’s programs, 70 percent in master’s programs, and 90 percent in doctoral programs.

MESRK is also responsible for licensing and attesting institutions teaching at any level of education, ensuring institutional compliance with relevant legislation, and assessing student learning outcomes. Until 2021 , MESRK, like many other post-Soviet education ministries, even regulated the format of diplomas earned at all public universities and at private universities accredited by a registered, independent accreditation agency .

Prior to independence, the government was entirely responsible for financing education. That changed rapidly in the early 1990s when the government legalized private ownership of educational institutions and introduced tuition fees at public universities. In recent years , around 29 percent of university students received state-funded grants; the rest paid out of pocket. At the elementary and secondary levels, the government recently introduced a per capita funding scheme, under which the amount of public funding a school receives will be determined by the number of students it enrolls. The government hopes that the new funding scheme will prompt school administrators to improve educational facilities and teaching quality, as schools compete for students and the government funding that comes with them.

While the government has long maintained tight control over all levels of education, recent reforms have attempted to decentralize education administration. To expand stakeholder engagement, governing boards of trustees were introduced in elementary and secondary schools and public universities in 2007. In schools, these boards are made up of parents and community representatives, although as of yet they play only a limited role in school governance. University boards, composed of public and private sector representatives, also lack significant operational autonomy, functioning mostly in an advisory capacity.

The 12-Year Compulsory Education Reform

The government has also embarked on expansive reforms aimed at modernizing the quality and structure of the country’s education system, among the most important of which is the extension of school education from 11 to 12 years. Still ongoing, the reform’s stalled implementation illustrates the challenges faced by Kazakhstani policymakers in modernizing the country’s education system.

The government first moved to update the elementary and secondary school cycle in the early 2000s. In 2001 , MESRK announced its intention to extend the education cycle from 11 to 12 years to better align the country’s education system with international norms. The reform would build on those of the country’s Soviet past; in 1985 , Mikhail Gorbachev, then the leader of the Soviet Union, introduced reforms that lengthened school education in all Soviet republics from 10 to 11 years. In the state education program adopted in 2004, SPED 2005-2010 , the government set a completion date of 2010.

But since it was first announced, implementation of the 12-year cycle has been repeatedly postponed, in large part, because of insufficient government funding. The SPED 2011-2020 attributed the delays to “insufficient material and technical resources, educational and methodical base, as well as the necessity of updating the content and methods of education.” It also laid out a new, staggered implementation schedule, set to begin in the 2015/16 academic year with grades 1, 5, and 11 and to end in 2019/20 with all grades operating under the 12-year system.

However, in late 2014, the collapse in global oil prices and falling government revenues forced MESRK to push the timeline back once more . As before, the need to develop a new curriculum; to print, distribute, and train teachers in the use of new textbooks; and to construct new learning facilities capable of handling an additional year of teaching held back reforms. The Minister of Education and Science stated in late 2019 that, “Our landmark is 2021. We are planning and are now laying in the draft national program.” In early 2021, MESRK announced that gradual implementation of the 12-year cycle would begin in 2023.

When finally implemented, the reform will add an additional year to the start of a student’s academic career, lowering the age at which students are required to begin elementary education from 7 to 6, while leaving the typical age at which students graduate from secondary school (age 17 or 18) unchanged. Although nationwide implementation has long been delayed, the 12-year cycle has been rolled out experimentally in a limited number of schools throughout the country. In 2012, it was piloted in over 100 schools. In 2015/16, 30 more were added, among them, Nazarbayev Intellectual Schools (NIS).

Academic Calendar and Language of Instruction

Kazakhstan possesses a rich mosaic of ethnicities and languages . Its two largest ethnic groups are Kazakh (63 percent) and Russian (24 percent). Its lengthy immersion in Russia’s sphere of influence, which long predates its absorption into the Soviet Union, has had a profound impact on the languages spoken throughout the country. Three decades after independence, more people in Kazakhstan speak Russian (94 percent) than Kazakh (83 percent), a Turkic language and the native language of the Kazakh people.

Kazakhstan’s language policies have evolved considerably in the decades since the country declared its independence. As part of Kazakhstan’s attempt to forge a unified national identity, the newly independent government initially promoted the spread of the Kazakh language, officially elevating it above all others. The country’s 1995 constitution , its second post-independence constitution, established Kazakh as the official national language, even going so far as to require that the president possess “a perfect command” of the Kazakh language. It accorded Russian less importance, granting it official status only in public institutions, where Russian was to be used on “equal grounds” with Kazakh.

More recently the government has pursued a trilingual policy aimed at increasing the population’s proficiency in Kazakh, Russian, and English. In recognition of English as the lingua franca of international business and trade, the policy set a goal of expanding the percentage of Kazakhstani citizens speaking English to 20 percent and the percentage speaking all three languages to 15 percent by 2020. Among other measures, the policy calls for expanding the share of government language training centers offering English language courses. While data suggest that the policy’s goals have been reached, with the CIA World Factbook estimating in 2017 that around 22 percent of the population speaks all three languages, as noted above, other organizations rate the country’s average English proficiency very low.

In line with state policy, MESRK has promoted the use of English in the country’s schools and universities, especially in the teaching of science, technology, and engineering subjects. Over 150 schools have introduced English as the language of instruction for biology, chemistry, information technology, and physics in grades 10 and 11, while hundreds of others offer optional courses and activities conducted in English. MESRK has also begun to organize English language training programs for teachers in these fields, rewarding those who achieve a high level of English competence with a pay bump. Policymakers are also hoping to introduce the next generation of students to English early. In 2016, English was made a compulsory subject at the preschool level.

Other significant linguistic reforms are underway in Kazakhstan. In 2017, President Nursultan Nazarbayev announced a gradual switch from a Cyrillic to a Latin alphabet in the writing of Kazakh, to be completed by 2025. Officials contend that the change is “part of a modernization drive and an attempt to make use of technology easier” and that it will “benefit Kazakhstan’s development” to adopt an alphabet used by 70 percent of the world. Implementation has since been delayed, with the government now hoping to complete the transition by 2031 . In the education system, the new alphabet will be introduced gradually as the country updates its textbooks in preparation for the implementation of the 12-year education model.

Although Kazakhstan’s 1995 constitution guarantees its citizens the right to “freely choose the language of communication, education, instruction and creative activities,” since independence, most educational institutions have offered instruction in either Kazakh or Russian. Naturally enough, the language of instruction used in a school or university typically mirrors that spoken most frequently by members of the community served by the school. Since independence, the use of Kazakh in schools and universities has grown. In the early 2000s, Russian was used as the language of instruction in universities 58 percent of the time; Kazakh, 40 percent; and Uzbek, around 1 percent. More recently, those percentages have been reversed. At the beginning of the 2020/21 academic year , 65 percent of university students were enrolled in programs taught in Kazakh, 29 percent in Russian-taught programs, and around 6 percent in English-taught programs.

At the elementary and secondary levels, the numbers are similar. More than half (51 percent) of general day schools, which teach all elementary and secondary grades, teach in Kazakh, while just 17 percent teach exclusively in Russian; 31 percent offer instruction in both Kazakh and Russian. Despite educating a majority of the country’s children, learning outcomes at Kazakh-medium schools lag those of their Russian-language counterparts. Results from the OECD’s 2012 Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) revealed large disparities in performance, with students in Kazakh-medium schools performing well behind their peers in Russian-medium schools.

No matter the language of instruction, the academic calendar in schools and universities throughout Kazakhstan typically runs from September to May or June. The elementary and secondary school year lasts for a maximum of 34 weeks and is typically divided into quarters. At higher education institutions, the academic year usually extends over 36 weeks, consisting of two semesters of 15 weeks plus breaks, although some institutions operate on a trimester or quarterly system.

Early Childhood Education

Of all stages of its education system, the turbulence of Kazakhstan’s first post-independence decade hit early childhood education (ECE) the hardest. In less than a decade, the well-organized preschool system inherited from its Soviet past almost completely collapsed, as government support dried up and the agricultural and industrial enterprises which ran many preschools closed. Preschool organizations (POs), which include a variety of institutions providing both childcare and pre-elementary education to children between the ages of 1 and 6 or 7, declined 88 percent between 1991 and 2000, from 8,881 to 1,089, according to government statistics . The enrollment decline was just as dramatic, falling from a peak of more than 1 million in 1991 to a bit less than 125,000 in 1999. The pre-elementary gross enrollment ratio (GER) fell from 82 percent to 15 percent over the same period.

Kazakhstan’s economic turnaround stemmed much of the bleeding, and enrollment levels remained more or less stable for the first decade of the twenty-first century. They began to take off around 2010, as the government turned its attention, and its growing tax receipts, toward ECE, focusing in particular on the year just before the start of elementary education. The Kazakhstan 2050 Strategy explicitly identified ECE as a priority, and the SPED 2011-2020 set a goal of expanding ECE enrollment to all children between the ages of three and six by 2020.

While that goal was not attained, the results have nonetheless been impressive. Enrollment in POs reached nearly 900,000 in 2019, a twenty-first century high. The following year, although absolute enrollment numbers declined slightly, the pre-elementary GER rose to 74 percent. While this growth has been remarkable, that Kazakhstan’s preschool enrollment numbers still trail their pre-independence peak reveals the depth of the disruption caused by the dissolution of the Soviet Union.

Today, access to ECE for all children ages one to six is a right guaranteed by the government. Parents can enroll their children in a number of different types of POs , both public and private. Most children attend kindergartens, which are divided into nursery kindergartens, attended by children between the ages of one and three, and regular kindergartens, attended by children ages three to six. The next most popular category of ECE provider is the preschool mini-center, introduced by the government to expand rural access. To accommodate rural conditions, MESRK grants mini-centers a high degree of flexibility, allowing them to shorten the school day or to operate from unconventional locations, such as community centers or private homes.

MESRK tightly controls the content of education provided at both public and private POs. It has approved four separate sets of curriculum guidelines for different age groups, each of which prescribes the subjects that must be taught and the materials, down to the books and toys, that can be used. Since 2016 , English has been a mandatory subject in preschools for children over the age of five. Unsurprisingly, domestic and international experts, including those drafting a 2017 OECD review of Kazakhstan’s ECE system, have criticized these arrangements as inflexible.

Despite efforts to expand access, that same 2017 OECD review identified “geographical, socio-economic, and special needs inequities regarding access to and participation in ECE.” In theory, enrollment in public preschools is free for three years , during which parents are responsible only for the cost of their child’s lunch. Instead of relying on private fees, both public and private preschools should receive adequate funding from the government, which currently determines the level of public funding each school receives by the number of students they enroll. But the OECD’s review found that the efficiency of this per capita funding scheme, while admirably intentioned, has been hampered by poorly calibrated funding levels, which have forced POs to charge parents to cover basic operational expenses. As a result, many Kazakhstanis still pay significant fees out of pocket. In 2010, the lowest income quintile spent, on average, a shocking 45 percent of their household expenditure on ECE, which the report concludes likely accounts for the low enrollment ratios for that quintile, just 19 percent of whom attended ECE.

Data also reveal regional disparities in access and enrollment. In a reversal of typical trends in Kazakhstan, ECE coverage in urban communities lags that of rural areas. The OECD’s 2018 Education Policy Outlook notes that regional rates of ECE participation for children over age 3 were lowest in the country’s two largest cities: Almaty and Nur-Sultan.

Further support of the ECE system could pay dividends. This same OECD policy brief notes that even after controlling for socioeconomic background, Kazakhstani students who had attended preschool for more than one year scored 11 points higher on the PISA 2012 than those who had never attended at all.

Elementary Education

In the short term, the chaos of the initial years of post-independence impacted elementary enrollment far less than it did preschool enrollment. Between 1990 and 1996, when enrollment peaked at nearly 1.4 million, growth was positive in every year but one, according to UIS data . Although the elementary GER did decline, the lowest it ever fell was 96 percent, which it reached in 1999.

Instead, the demographic contraction of that first decade had a delayed impact on enrollment levels. Starting in 1997, elementary enrollment began a more than decadelong decline, falling to a low of less than 950,000 in 2007. The rise in birthrates, which began in the early 2000s, eventually reversed the decline. Elementary enrollment has increased steadily since 2010, growing by more than half by 2020, when it exceeded 1.5 million.

Public school education—elementary and secondary—in Kazakhstan is compulsory and available free to all Kazakhstani citizens and has been since the adoption of Kazakhstan’s current constitution in 1995. Prior to 2020, students typically entered elementary school at the age of seven, although students passing an entrance examination could begin a year earlier. As of 2020, all students must begin elementary education, which lasts for just four years (grades 1 to 4), at the age of six, an adjustment aimed at keeping the typical age of graduation from upper secondary school the same following the country’s transition to a 12-year education model.

The elementary curriculum is organized around a handful of educational fields, including language and literacy, mathematics and computer science, natural sciences, man and society (which aims at “studying the social phenomena of the past and present and their interrelations”), technology and art, and physical education. Students must study two languages: one native, such as Kazakh, Russian, or another local language; and one foreign language, typically English. Instructional hours at the elementary level are currently capped at 29 hours per week.

Lower Secondary Education

Secondary education is divided into two phases: lower, which is known in Kazakhstan as basic secondary education, and upper, which is known as senior or general secondary education. In Kazakhstan, the phrase “general secondary education” is not used exclusively to refer to the final phase of secondary education; it is often also used to refer to the entire cycle of school education, from grades 1 to 11 or 12.

Under the 11-year system, basic secondary education lasts for five years, spanning grades 5 to 9. Under the 12-year system, lower secondary education will be extended by one year, lasting from grade 5 to grade 10. The subjects taught under the 12-year system will differ little from those taught under the old system. Currently, the basic secondary education curriculum includes arts, computer sciences, history, languages and literature, mathematics, natural sciences (such as physics, chemistry, biology, and geography), and physical education. After completing the required period of study, students take a final attestation , or final certification, exam. Students passing both their coursework and the final attestation exam are awarded the Certificate of Basic Secondary Education (Svidetel’stvo ob okonchanii osnovnoy shkoly).

Since the 2011/12 school year, at the end of grade 9, some basic secondary students have also had to sit for a standardized, national competency assessment, the External Assessments of Student Achievement (EASA), 8  administered at a sample of schools throughout the country. The EASA tests students in Kazakh and three other subjects selected by MESRK. While EASA results have no impact on students’ academic progression, they are used by the Committee for Control in the Field of Education and Science (CCFES), a MESRK board, to compare the quality of teaching at different schools, to assess aggregate learning outcomes, and to monitor the country’s progress toward achieving its education goals. In 2015 , the EASA was introduced at the end of grade 4; in 2017, it was expanded to grade 11.

Upper Secondary Education

After completing basic secondary education, usually at around age 15, students are able to choose between two different streams: academic, also referred to simply as general secondary, and vocational. In 2017, around 60 percent of students at the upper secondary level were enrolled in the academic stream and 40 percent in the vocational stream, according to the 2018 OECD Education Policy Outlook mentioned above. All students electing to pursue general secondary education are automatically enrolled in the first two years of senior secondary education, grades 10 and 11 in the old system and grades 11 and 12 in the new 12-year system.

Compulsory general secondary education subjects are algebra and the beginning of analysis, biology, chemistry, geography, geometry, the history of Kazakhstan, human society and the fundamentals of law, information technology, Kazakh or Russian language and literature, a foreign language (typically English), physics, and world history. Students in upper secondary education study a maximum of 39 hours per week. They are graded on a five-point scale, with 3 representing the minimum passing grade and 5, the highest.

Since 2017, students completing the final year of upper secondary education sit for a final attestation , or final certification, examination that tests four mandatory subjects (algebra and the beginning of analysis, the history of Kazakhstan, Kazakh or Russian language, and native language and literature) and one elective subject. Students passing their courses and the examination are awarded the Certificate of General Secondary Education (Attestat o obshchem srednem obrazovanii).

Students hoping to enroll in higher education programs can also sit for the Unified National Test (UNT), discussed in more detail below. Prior to 2017, the UNT played a far more important role in the country’s education system, functioning as both a university entrance examination and an upper secondary school-leaving examination, although students opting not to take the UNT were still able to graduate. Results from the UNT were also used by MESRK to rank teachers, schools, and regions. The practice has since been abandoned because of criticism that it could lead to unfair comparisons.

School Infrastructure and Facilities

Most Kazakhstani students are enrolled in general day schools which teach all grades, from elementary to upper secondary. New schools must be licensed before they can begin teaching and must undergo inspection, a process known as attestation, every five years. Both the licensing and attestation process are managed by MESRK.

Despite near universal enrollment, school facilities in much of the country remain inadequate. In heavily populated urban areas, schools commonly operate in multiple shifts, with students in certain grades attending in the morning, and those in other grades, in the evening. In the 2009/10 school year, two-thirds of all schools operated in two or more shifts. The SPED 2011-2020 indicated that there were even 70 three-shift schools and one that had four shifts. Multiple-shift schools must often shorten teaching hours, making it difficult for them to meet the minimum instructional hours set by MESRK.

On the other hand, in rural areas, classes are at times so small that the government has authorized multi-grade teaching. These small rural schools, known as small-class or ungraded schools, are often plagued by teacher shortages and decaying infrastructure. The OECD’s 2018 policy outlook notes that 42 percent of public schools were small-class, catering to just 8 percent of all students.

These school and teacher shortages may partly explain Kazakhstan’s poor performance in PISA assessments . On the 2018 PISA , Kazakhstani students scored well below the OECD average in all three subjects: reading, mathematics, and science. Perhaps even more concerning, Kazakhstan’s 2018 scores in every subject declined from those achieved during previous PISA cycles. Given this decline, it seems unlikely that the disparities in learning outcomes revealed by the results of previous PISA tests were reversed. A 2015 OECD Review of School Resources in Kazakhstan noted that 2012 PISA data revealed that “the language of instruction in schools (Kazakh or Russian), school location (urban or rural), and the socio-economic background of students and schools make a difference in students’ performance.”

Nazarbayev Intellectual Schools (NIS) and Nazarbayev University

Kazakhstan also maintains a network of highly competitive, state-funded learning institutions known as Nazarbayev Intellectual Schools (NIS). In the words of their eponymous founder , Kazakhstan’s first president, Nursultan Nazarbayev, the aim of NIS is to prepare “the next generation of global-minded leaders in Kazakhstan” to fill key roles in the country’s government and major corporations, and to function as “platforms for testing and development of up-to-date academic programs.”

Since the first NIS opened in Astana in 2008, their numbers have grown steadily. There are currently 20 NIS operating in all 14 oblyslar. NIS teach all grades of the 12-year elementary and secondary education cycle. Instruction is conducted in all three of the languages promoted in the government’s trilingual policy—Kazakh, Russian, and English—although upper secondary education is delivered entirely in English.

Although NIS follow the same State Curriculum Standards as all other Kazakhstani schools, their facilities, funding levels, and teacher qualifications are all far superior. NIS also have far more flexibility to innovate and adapt to student needs. Although their funding is ultimately provided by the government, NIS operate autonomously , free from government interference. In theory, this arrangement allows them to pilot the most modern education methods and programs, the most successful of which will then be rolled out nationwide.

In 2010, President Nazarbayev launched a similar initiative at the higher education level. Nazarbayev University is a publicly funded research institution intended to be a “ leading model of higher education , which would establish a benchmark for all higher education institutions of the country.” Also governed independently of the state, Nazarbayev University has been granted an exceptional degree of academic freedom, allowing it to develop education programs on its own and to experiment with the latest teaching and research methods. The university is also intended to be a model of internationalization, partnering with leading universities and attracting top scholars from around the globe.

Nazarbayev University, Nur-Sultan, Kazakhstan

But both NIS and Nazarbayev University have been criticized for exacerbating educational and socioeconomic inequality. Commentators have warned that the establishment of NIS may eventually result in the creation of two, unequal streams of education , with the bulk of the country’s students unable to access the high-quality education NIS provide. Others have criticized them for drawing a disproportionate share of overall government spending on education, funds that could be used more efficiently to improve the entire education system if spread more broadly. A 2017 OECD review of Kazakhstan’s higher education system notes that: “Nazarbayev University is consuming a large portion of total public spending. At best, this is an experiment that carries substantial risks: it is an open question whether any excellence that the university may achieve can outweigh reduced funding for the rest of the system, and whether this excellence can be shared in a way that benefits the entire system of higher education.”

Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET)

The government of Kazakhstan views technical and vocational education and training (TVET), often known in Kazakhstan as technical and professional education (TPE), as an important means of meeting the country’s development goals. The SPED 2011-2020 identified the modernization of the country’s TVET system “in accordance with the demands of society and industrial-innovative development of economy, integration into the global educational space” as a priority. Other government plans, including MESRK’s Action Plan for 2014 to 2016, have sought to expand the network of TVET institutions nationwide, to improve TVET teacher training, and to promote industry partnerships.

TVET in Kazakhstan is administered by the Technical and Vocational Education Department of MESRK. The department is responsible for overall planning and monitoring of the sector, as well as the management of industry partnerships and teacher training.

Vocational Secondary Education

After completing basic secondary education, students can choose to enter either the general academic stream or the vocational stream. Students choosing the vocational stream enroll in specialized TVET colleges, which often offer both secondary and post-secondary TVET qualifications. There are currently more than 750 technical and professional colleges in Kazakhstan, 58 percent of which are public; the rest are private. As mentioned above, around 40 percent of all upper secondary students are enrolled in the technical and vocational stream.

Vocational secondary education programs are typically longer than general secondary education programs, lasting from three to four years. After completing the required coursework and training, students sit for a vocational examination or submit a graduation project, after which successful students are awarded a Diploma of Vocational Secondary Education, sometimes also translated as Diploma of Technical and Professional Education. Although designed to prepare graduates for work as qualified technical and service professionals, students earning a TVET diploma can also progress to a post-secondary TVET program or a general academic higher education program. Those hoping to enroll in a higher education institution sit for the Complex Test of Applicants (CTA), a university entrance examination that differs from the Unified National Test (UNT) taken by general secondary school graduates.

TVET programs are offered in more than 150 professions in fields such as agriculture, business, construction, education, health care, and industry, among others. As at other levels of the education system, MESRK controls the content and methodology of all TVET training programs, developing State Compulsory Standards that define the subjects and curricula that can be taught throughout the country. Programs typically contain a mix of practical, on-the-job training and theoretical coursework. Curricula are modular, allowing students to complete independent units in any order, and are intended to prepare students with the skills needed to enter the labor market.

Post-secondary Vocational Education

Students can also be admitted to post-secondary technical and vocational programs after completing general or vocational upper secondary school. These post-secondary TVET programs typically last between two and three years.

Like the vocational secondary stream, post-secondary TVET programs are quite popular. According to data cited in the 2014 OECD review of secondary education in Kazakhstan , 45 percent of all students entering post-secondary institutions enrolled in technical and vocational programs in 2011.

After passing the required courses and training, students passing a vocational examination or completing a graduation project are awarded a vocational diploma. As with some vocational upper secondary diplomas, these post-secondary diplomas are typically translated into English as a Diploma of Technical and Professional Education . Students earning a post-secondary vocational diploma often enter the workforce or enroll in general academic higher education institutions.

Higher Education

Kazakhstan’s higher education system has changed dramatically since independence. In an attempt to create a higher education system able to meet the demands of the country’s emerging market economy, policymakers have progressively reduced the government’s role in financing and supervising the sector, adopting reforms that would more closely align the system with international standards. Their success has been mixed. At times, reforms have moved too quickly or gone too far, exacerbating the problems they were meant to solve; while at others, change has moved too slowly, with government reformers finding the Soviet legacy hard to throw off.

Higher education in Kazakhstan has its beginnings in the 1920s, shortly after the country was incorporated into the Soviet Union as an autonomous republic. In the seven decades that followed, educational authorities developed a higher education system aimed primarily at developing technically competent specialists to help the Soviet Union meet its economic, political, and cultural objectives. In contrast to the research universities prevalent in the West, universities throughout the Soviet Union focused almost exclusively on teaching. Most basic and applied research was conducted outside of universities in specialized institutes or academies, many of which were located outside of Kazakhstan itself.

Control over higher education during the Soviet era was also tightly centralized, allowing government planners in Moscow or Alma-Ata, as Almaty was known prior to 1993, to determine the subjects offered and the number of seats available in accordance with Soviet or republican objectives. In the Kazakh SSR, most higher education institutions were narrowly focused on either engineering, to support the oil and gas industry, or pedagogy, to achieve the Soviet Union’s goal of universal literacy. Graduates of these institutions received state diplomas that guaranteed them employment in government ministries or state-owned enterprises.

Although the Soviet Union developed a solid network of institutions—55 by independence—demand for university seats in the Kazakh SSR still far exceeded supply. In 1989, there were 226 applicants for every 100 university seats. Access to higher education was especially limited for much of the country’s large rural population. Soviet-era universities in the Kazakh SSR were almost universally established in urban centers or in resource-rich regions.

Independence brought disruption. With its revenue falling, the government passed the Law on Higher Education in 1993, which for the first time legalized the establishment of private universities. It also altered funding and ownership regulations for public universities. The government introduced tuition fees at previously free public universities and sold shares in a handful of them to private investors. This drive to privatize the funding and ownership of higher education institutions represented a significant departure from the Soviet era when the government was almost completely responsible for funding and administration.

These changes led to a rapid proliferation of private higher education institutions. Over the next decade, the number of universities more than tripled, peaking at more than 180 in 2001 , with nearly all of the growth driven by private institutions. Enrollment took slightly longer to increase, remaining largely stagnant until the late 1990s. However, as the economy started to heat up around the start of the new millennium, young Kazakhstanis began to flood into universities. By the 2005/06 academic year, around 775,000 students were enrolled in higher education institutions, more than double the number a decade earlier.

Higher Education in Transition: Quality, Governance, and Internalization Reforms

The rapid rise in the number of private higher education institutions was not accompanied by a similar increase in the funding for or rigor of oversight and quality assurance mechanisms. As a result, education quality in many of the country’s universities deteriorated sharply, while incidences of corruption and academic fraud rose rapidly. Bribes from private and public university administrators reportedly helped sway the decisions of ministry officials responsible for licensing and attesting higher education institutions; prospective students also used bribes to influence university admissions officers. Deception even spread to labs and lecture halls, where cheating was reportedly rampant. The SPED 2011-2020 noted that “Corruption has been a serious latent factor encompassing the entire system of higher education in Kazakhstan.”

With the booming economy placing the country’s public finances on a more solid footing, these challenges prompted the government to introduce expansive reforms aimed at improving and modernizing the country’s higher education system. To address concerns about corruption, the government introduced standardized national university entrance examinations, and for university freshmen, mandatory classes designed to deter cheating.

The government also tightened quality assurance and accreditation processes. Beginning in the early 2000s, it began introducing stricter higher education licensing regulations and rolling out a system of voluntary accreditation. In 2006, it explicitly introduced an “optimization policy” aimed at improving the overall quality of the higher education system by strictly monitoring quality standards and forcing low-performing institutions to merge or close.

So far, the latter policy has proved effective. From 2005 to 2020, the number of universities in Kazakhstan declined by nearly a third, falling from more than 180 to 125— 33 public and 92 private , according to government statistics. The government hopes that improved oversight and quality standards will eventually reduce that number to 100.

Perhaps also driving the shuttering of institutions, which today are largely financed by student tuition fees, was declining demand for higher education. The number of Kazakhstanis between the ages of 20 and 24 fell by a third between 2010 and 2020, from more than 1.6 million in 2010 to 1.1 million in 2020. As a result, university enrollment has also declined, falling by more than 40 percent from its peak in 2005/06 to around 460,000 in 2015/16. Although numbers have since stabilized, policymakers expect university enrollment to decline or remain stagnant until 2025 .

The government has also embarked on other significant reforms, most notably those aimed at aligning the country’s higher education system with international standards. In 2010, Kazakhstan became the 47 th signatory of the Bologna Process and the first Central Asian nation to join the European Higher Education Area (EHEA). Its long-planned accession—Kazakhstan signed the Lisbon Recognition Convention in 1999—was accompanied by significant changes to the country’s higher education system, including the restructuring of its qualification and credit system, the introduction of external accreditation agencies, and a gradual expansion of institutional autonomy.

Despite these reforms, much work remains to be done. Even after conceding some of its oversight authority—authorizing boards of trustees in 2007 and relinquishing some of its control over curriculum content—MESRK still tightly regulates administrative processes and academic decisions at both public and private higher education institutions. It still establishes the set of programs and specialties that universities can offer, a list known as the Classifier of Specialties of Undergraduate and Postgraduate Education , and sets State Compulsory Standards (SCS) that prescribe large portions of curriculum content. MESRK also enforces standardized faculty promotion schedules and sets limits to the amount of tuition public universities can charge, among other administrative regulations. Although the government passed a law in 2018 pledging to further expand the financial, organizational, and academic autonomy of higher education institutions, the ultimate impact of the law remains to be seen.

Higher Education Institutions

MESRK classifies all higher education institutions in Kazakhstan, both public and private, into different categories according to the number of programs taught and degree of research conducted. An institution’s classification is usually determined when it first receives its operating license from MESRK, although private institutions expanding their program offerings or research output can apply to MESRK for recertification and reclassification. An institution’s classification has significant implications for its academic and administrative autonomy. According to a 2017 report from the Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA), “Depending on their status, the institutions can determine requirements for admission, implement self-developed education programs, use their own rules and regulations in educational, scientific and methodological activities, and issue their own diplomas of education.”

While institutional classifications continue to evolve, in general, the government currently categorizes higher education institutions in Kazakhstan into the following types:

• National research universities , which offer undergraduate and post-graduate programs in a wide range of disciplines. They are expected to engage heavily in basic and applied research and are granted significant autonomy in creating their own academic programs. According to government data , as of the start of the 2020/21 academic year, there are just two national research universities, Al-Farabi Kazakh National University and Satbayev University , both located in Almaty.
• National universities , which are leading public teaching and research institutions offering programs in a minimum of three disciplines. National universities are so designated by presidential decree. There are currently nine national universities located exclusively in the country’s two largest cities, Almaty (six) and Nur-Sultan (three).
• Research universities and universities , which in the most recent government statistics have been treated together, are the most common type of higher education institution. Found in every region of the country, there are a total of 83. These institutions offer government-approved programs in a minimum of three disciplines. As is the case with national research universities and national universities, these institutions have extensive research mandates.
• Academies , which are specialized institutions offering first- and second-cycle programs in one or two disciplines. There are currently 17 academies operating throughout the country.
• Institutes and their equivalents, such as conservatories, higher schools, or higher specialized schools and colleges, which offer educational programs in more specialized, professional disciplines. Fourteen institutes currently train Kazakhstani students in engineering, music, teaching, and other disciplines.

These institutions are owned and operated by several distinct entities, including the national government (which owns 9 institutions), regional governments (31), non-civil government ministries (13), international organizations (1), public-private joint-stock companies (16), private organizations (54), and, a category unique to Nazarbayev University, Autonomous Organization of Education (1). Private institutions, which in the latest government statistics include the joint-stock universities owned partly by both private and public entities, make up nearly three-quarters (74 percent) of all institutions in Kazakhstan and enroll more than two-thirds of all students (68 percent).

Kazakhstani higher education institutions offer full-time, part-time, evening, and remote study in three principal languages: Kazakh, Russian, and English. As of the beginning of the 2020/21 academic year , nearly two-thirds (65 percent) of all students were enrolled in Kazakh-medium programs, 29 percent in Russian-medium programs, and 6 percent in English-medium programs.

Despite high enrollment ratios—Kazakhstan’s tertiary gross enrollment ratio (GER) reached an astonishing 71 percent in 2020—access to the country’s higher education institutions for many eligible youth remains limited. Many rural young people are physically separated from the country’s universities by long distances, as most higher education institutions are located in urban centers. In fact, nearly half are in just three cities: 41 in Almaty, 15 in Nur-Sultan, and 10 in Shymkent. As a result, wide disparities in access exist between urban and rural students. In 2015, 40 percent of urban Kazakhstanis between the age of 18 and 22 were enrolled in higher education, compared with just 14 percent of rural Kazakhstanis.

The research capacity of most Kazakhstani universities also remains limited, in part a legacy of the Soviet separation of teaching and research. Even today, faculty members usually carry heavy teaching loads and administrative responsibilities, leaving them little time to conduct research. Critics also contend that faculty hiring and promotion decisions, which they allege are often shaped by nepotism and a weak culture of meritocracy, do nothing to incentivize research activities. Although the SPED 2011-2020 announced the government’s intention to increase the proportion of faculty members publishing in top international journals, official statistics suggest that little progress has been made.

Despite these challenges, a number of Kazakhstani universities appeared among the top 1,000 in the QS World University Rankings 2021 , including Al-Farabi Kazakh National University (165), L.N. Gumilyov Eurasian National University (357), and Auezov South Kazakhstan University (490). While these QS rankings are impressive, Kazakhstani institutions performed less well on the other major international rankings. No Kazakhstani university appears among the top 1,000 in either the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2021 or the Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU) 2020 .

University Admissions

To be admitted to higher education institutions in Kazakhstan, students must have successfully completed secondary education, either the general academic stream or the vocational stream, and must take one of two nationally standardized university entrance examinations. Students completing the general academic secondary stream, who make up the majority of all university students, sit for the Unified National Test (UNT). 9  Administered by the National Testing Center (NTC) of the MESRK, the UNT was introduced at the start of the 2003/04 academic year in an attempt to reduce corruption and increase the transparency of the university admissions process by minimizing the arbitrary discretion of university admissions officers. Since 2017, the UNT has included five subject examinations , three of which are compulsory: mathematical literacy (numeracy), reading literacy, and the history of Kazakhstan.

Students who graduated from a TVET secondary school or a secondary school teaching in a language other than Kazakh or Russian sit for an alternative entrance examination, known as the Complex Testing of Applicants (CTA). International students applying to study in a Kazakh university are typically exempt from both UNT and CTA examinations. Instead, universities set their own admission standards for international students.

Students who score high on the UNT are guaranteed a seat at a public university and may be issued government-funded merit scholarships. Students can use these grants to enroll in programs identified by the government as critical to the nation’s development and taught in institutions accredited by one of the recognized accrediting bodies.

However, these merit scholarships have been criticized as an inefficient use of government resources. The 2017 OECD review of Kazakhstan’s higher education system mentioned above noted that “State grants to students, typically awarded on the basis of academic merit, often pay the tuition and living costs of students who would likely be able to meet these costs using their family’s or their own resources.”

This misallocation of funds exacerbates the problems caused by low levels of public spending on higher education. Government expenditure on tertiary education was just .3 percent of GDP in 2019, well below the OECD average of 1.6 percent. That same 2017 OECD review noted that far more of Kazakhstan’s higher education expenditure comes from private sources than the OECD average—nearly 70 percent in 2014, compared with 31 percent among all OECD countries. It concluded that low public spending has weakened the quality of teaching and research at Kazakhstani universities and forced institutions to lean heavily on tuition fees for financing.

The Tertiary Degree Structure

The Bologna Process brought significant changes to Kazakhstan’s higher education system. Prior to the reforms, degrees offered in Kazakhstani universities still resembled those prevalent during the Soviet era. These included long specialist diplomas, lasting anywhere from four to five and a half years, after which students could enroll in advanced study programs such as the Kandidat Nauk, or Candidate of Sciences, which typically required an additional three years of study. Students earning a Kandidat Nauk could then continue their studies and research in a higher doctoral program known as the Doktor Nauk, or Doctor of Sciences.

Most of these credentials were phased out by 2010 and replaced by shorter, three-cycle qualifications. The three-cycle structure was further formalized in 2012, when Kazakhstan introduced a National Qualifications Framework (NQF) aligned with the European Qualifications Framework (EQF). Despite these changes, certain medical programs remain exceptions, requiring five or more years of study and leading to a specialist diploma.

Today, programs in all three cycles are required to include a professional practice component, whether teacher training or work placement. Starting from 2021, accredited public and private universities will also be able to design and award their own diplomas. As noted above, prior to 2021, all public universities and those private universities accredited by a recognized accreditation agency awarded standardized state diplomas bearing the MESRK seal.

Today, the overwhelming majority of students are enrolled in first-cycle, or bachelor’s degree, programs. According to the Committee on Statistics of the Ministry of National Economy, in the 2018/19 academic year, around 92 percent of students were enrolled in undergraduate programs, 7 percent in master’s degree programs, and just 1 percent, or a little under 5,000 students, in doctoral programs.

Credit System and Grading Scale

Most Kazakhstani universities today use a unique national credit system , although in recent years more and more institutions have begun to include or to even exclusively use European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System (ECTS) credits. Under the Kazakh credit system, one credit unit corresponds to 45 study hours , which typically comprise 15 hours of classroom study and 30 hours of independent student work per week.

Universities in Kazakhstan often use letter grades and a corresponding 4.0 grading scale. Students typically need to earn a cumulative grade point average (GPA) of 2.0 or above to graduate. At most institutions, bachelor’s and master’s students graduating with a cumulative GPA of 3.5 or above are issued diplomas with honors.

Despite the current prevalence of this unique credit and grading system, the government is still expected to require all institutions to transition to the ECTS system, under which a full academic year would include 60 ECTS credits or 1,800 academic hours, some time in the future. In preparation for this change, many institutions publish conversion tables that explain how Kazakhstani credits and grades are to be converted into their ECTS equivalents. At most institutions, conversion coefficients from Kazakhstani credits into ECTS credits typically vary between 1.5 to 1.8 national credits to 1 ECTS credit.

First Cycle

Kazakhstan adopted a shortened first-cycle degree program earlier than it did the other two cycles. In the 2004/05 academic year, Kazakhstan introduced a four-year bachelor’s degree program (diplom bakalavra) , which replaced the longer Soviet-era Diploma of Specialist (diplom spetsialista) . The bakalavra usually requires a minimum of four years of study and the completion of 129 Kazakh credits (or 240 ECTS credits), at least 6 of which are earned in professional practice. All students must also sit and pass a state examination on the history of Kazakhstan . Students take another external examination in their final year of study, the External Assessment of Academic Achievements (EAAA), a competency assessment administered by the National Testing Center (NTC) of MESRK and aimed at evaluating students’ mastery of the knowledge that is basic to their major field of study (the EAAA is discussed in more detail below). To graduate, students must write and defend a thesis or pass a comprehensive examination.

MESRK gives institutions less control over bakalavra programs than they do for second- and third-cycle programs. As of 2015, institutions have been able to develop up to 55 percent of the content of the bakalavra curricula, although all programs must follow the guidelines set by the State Compulsory Standards (SCS). In line with these guidelines, students are usually required to pass a minimum number of compulsory component (CC) courses, which are required by the government, and university component (UC) courses. Required courses are further divided into general education discipline (GED), core discipline (CD), and major discipline (MD) courses, and include courses in both the Kazakh and Russian languages. Despite these strict program requirements, students are usually still given the freedom to enroll in a number of elective component (EC) courses.

Second Cycle

Both post-graduate cycles were introduced in 2010, following Kazakhstan’s signing of the Bologna Accord. To be admitted to a second-cycle program, the diplom magistra or master’s degree, students must possess a bakalavra. They must also sit for two entrance examinations: one administered by the university in the discipline they wish to pursue; and another, a foreign language test, administered by the NTC.

Master’s degree programs typically require between one and two years of classroom study, practical training, and research. One-year programs, often referred to as professional master’s, are typically more practical in nature, requiring the completion of 24 credits (60 ECTS credits). Two-year programs are usually more research intensive, requiring 55 credits (120 ECTS credits) and the writing and defense of a thesis. Master’s students must also sit for a subject-specific EAAA examination in the final year of the program.

Universities are granted far more autonomy—they can determine up to 70 percent of the content of their master’s degree programs. The Classifier of Specialties of Undergraduate and Postgraduate Education currently allows Kazakhstani universities to offer diplom magistra programs in a variety of different scientific and pedagogic disciplines .

Third Cycle

Third-cycle programs include professional and research doctorates. To be admitted, students must possess a master’s degree; students pursuing a medical doctorate must have completed their medical residency. All students must also sit for an entrance examination administered by the university in their specialty and a foreign language examination administered by the NTC.

Doctorates require a minimum of three years of advanced coursework, research, and professional practice, including the completion of a minimum of 75 credits (180 ECTS credits). Programs usually require that half of these credits be earned in theoretical training and coursework , and six earned in professional practice. The remainder, slightly less than half, are typically guided research credits, earned as students prepare to write and defend a dissertation.

Public universities teach the vast majority of doctoral programs and award the vast majority of doctoral degrees. Like master’s degree programs, doctoral programs are offered in many different scientific and pedagogical disciplines . MESRK regulates doctoral programs lightly, granting institutions control over up to 90 percent of course content.

Professional Education

As mentioned above, the structure of many medical programs still resembles those of Soviet-era qualifications. These programs include health and social welfare medicine, veterinary medicine, and veterinary sanitation, all of which lead to the award of a specialist diploma and require at least five years of study and the completion of 167 credits. Even medical programs that have adopted degree titles that more closely resemble the terminology used for other post-Bologna first-cycle programs retain this older structure. Recently introduced medical qualifications, such as the Bachelor of Medicine (medïcïna bakalavri) and the Bachelor of Dentistry (Stomatologïya bakalavri), still typically require five years of study.

Advanced medical training also usually differs from other second- and third-cycle qualifications. It is often conducted through residency programs of varying length, at the end of which graduates are awarded a Certificate of Residency (Svidetelstvo ob okonchanii rezidenturi).

Quality Assurance and Accreditation

Higher education accreditation and quality assurance in Kazakhstan is complex and still evolving. Although it continues to bear the imprints of the country’s legacy of centralized state control, in recent years, the government has relinquished a significant degree of its oversight responsibilities to external bodies in line with the recommendations of international organizations.

Quality management in Kazakhstan starts well before an institution opens its doors. Before any teaching can take place, MESRK must evaluate and license proposed academic institutions. MESRK largely bases its licensing decisions on its evaluation of the detailed application and supporting documentation submitted by the representatives of the proposed institution. MESRK only issues licenses to institutions found to be in compliance with the standards set by the government regarding staff qualifications, finances, infrastructure, student services, governance arrangements, and program offerings, among others.

MESRK continues to monitor academic institutions even after they receive their license to operate. Until recently, this oversight was almost completely carried out through a state-led process known as attestation, although recent reforms have shifted many aspects of the process to external accreditation agencies .

Managed by the Committee for Control of Education and Science (CCES) of MESRK, institutional attestation is designed to ensure that an institution’s educational infrastructure, faculty qualifications, teaching quality, and learning outcomes, among others, meet State Compulsory Standards . Institutions that do not meet those standards have their licenses revoked and must cease operating. While in recent years the government has exempted more and more higher education institutions from attestation, certain state-run military academies and other specialized institutions are still subject to the process at five-year intervals.

As part of the attestation process, CCES considers student scores on the External Assessments of Academic Achievements (EAAAs). As mentioned above, the National Testing Center (NTC) of MESRK administers the EAAA, a subject-specific competency assessment, to students in the final years of their undergraduate and postgraduate programs. These competency examinations, which are uncommon internationally, have been criticized as incompatible with the principle of university autonomy and as detrimental to the quality of the country’s higher education sector, as they skew teaching toward preparation for the examinations. While students failing a previous version of these examinations risked expulsion from their university, today, the results of the EEEA do not impact students’ academic progression. Instead, the results are used by CCES to evaluate the performance of academic institutions and their eligibility for attestation.

The most significant change to the country’s quality assurance mechanisms in recent years has been its embrace of voluntary accreditation conducted by external accrediting bodies. While MESRK piloted, then quickly walked back, a version of voluntary accreditation in the early 2000s, it only started to recognize external accreditation agencies after 2010, when Kazakhstan became a full member of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA). Guided by the principles laid down in the Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance in the European Higher Education Area (ESG), the foundation for quality assurance throughout the EHEA, the SPED 2011-2020 called for the gradual transfer of quality assurance responsibilities from the MESRK’s attestation process to a system of voluntary accreditation conducted by independent accreditation agencies. Shortly thereafter, MESRK established a National Register of Accreditation Bodies modeled on the European Quality Assurance Register for Higher Education (EQAR), which registers European quality assurance agencies complying with the ESG.

Since 2010, MESRK has moved to incentivize accreditation. The government has restricted public funding to institutions or programs accredited by one of the agencies listed on the National Register of Accreditation Bodies. It has also exempted educational organizations from state attestation procedures as long as they have acquired and maintain institutional or program accreditation. In 2017, it even prohibited unaccredited institutions from issuing official state diplomas. These measures have proved effective. As of 2020, 92 percent of Kazakhstani higher education institutions had obtained institutional accreditation, and 96 percent had obtained program, or specialized, accreditation.

MESRK currently recognizes 11 accreditation bodies : six Kazakhstani agencies, which can accredit both institutions and individual academic programs; and five international agencies, which are approved to accredit specific programs only. Currently, the largest accrediting bodies are both based in Kazakhstan: the Independent Agency for Quality Assurance in Education (IQAA) and the Independent Agency for Accreditation and Rating (IAAR). Higher education institutions are free to choose which of the recognized agencies they would like to review their institutions or programs.

Although independent accreditation agencies have assumed much of MESRK’s former quality assurance responsibilities vis-à-vis higher education institutions and programs, MESRK, in line with ESG guidelines, retains ultimate responsibility for the regulation of these independent agencies. MESRK initially evaluates and then recertifies accrediting bodies every five years. Still, it allows these agencies wide latitude to develop their own accreditation standards, provided the standards comply with those established in the ESG. Although varying by agency, accreditation procedures typically include the evaluation of university self-assessments and on-site visits.

Currently, the National Register of Accreditation Bodies , as well as a list of accredited academic institutions and programs , can be found on the website of the Bologna Process and Academic Mobility Center , a subdivision of MESRK.

Click here for a PDF file of the academic documents referred to below:

• Certificate of General Secondary Education (Attestat o srednem obshchem obrazovanii)
• Diploma of Technical and Professional Education
• Bachelor’s Degree (diplom bakalavra)
• Bachelor of Medicine (medïcïna bakalavri)
• Diploma of Specialist (diplom spetsialista)
• Master’s Degree (diplom magistra)
• Doctorate (doctor)

1. As measured by purchasing power parity (PPP) in current international dollars.

2. Although not a member of the OECD, Kazakhstan cooperates closely with the organization on a number of domestic and regional development initiatives. Kazakhstan’s relatively high per capita GDP—the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF’s) 2021 estimates rank it the 52 nd highest in the world—make comparisons between Kazakhstan and OECD member states both informative and common. The OECD, in its many reports and analyses of Kazakhstan and its educational system, frequently indexes the country against the OECD average.

3. As a source of outbound degree-seeking students, Kazakhstan trails only the more familiar giants: China, India, Germany, Vietnam, South Korea, France, and the United States.

4. Student mobility data from different sources such as UNESCO, the Institute of International Education, and the governments of various countries may be inconsistent, in some cases showing substantially different numbers of international students. This lack of consistency is due to a number of factors, including data capture methodology, definitions of international student, and types of mobility captured (credit, degree, etc.). The policy of WENR is not to favor any given source over another, but to be transparent about what we are reporting and to footnote numbers that may raise questions about discrepancies.

5. The OECD report also identified the country’s restrictive student visa policies as a deterrent to prospective international students. Currently, the Ministry of Education and Science (MESRK) publishes an annual list of countries eligible to send international students to Kazakhstan the following academic year. This process injects significant levels of uncertainty into the study plans of prospective international students who from year to year can never be sure whether MESRK will deem their country eligible to send students.

6. The four special status cities are Almaty (Kazakhstan’s commercial center and its most populous city), Baikonur, Nur-Sultan (the capital, known as Astana between 1998 and 2019), and Shymkent.

7. Also translated as State Compulsory Education Standards (SCES).

8. Also translated as External Assessment of Educational Achievements (EAEA).

9. Also translated as Common National Test (CNT).

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Essay on Kazakhstan

Students are often asked to write an essay on Kazakhstan in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

Let’s take a look…

100 Words Essay on Kazakhstan

Introduction to kazakhstan.

Kazakhstan is a big country in Central Asia. It’s the ninth-largest in the world. This place used to be part of the Soviet Union until 1991. Now it’s its own country with Astana as the capital.

People and Culture

Lots of people live in Kazakhstan, from different backgrounds. They have their own language, Kazakh, but many also speak Russian. They enjoy music, dance, and tasty food like beshbarmak.

Nature and Geography

Kazakhstan has mountains, flat lands, and lakes. The land is home to animals like snow leopards. People visit to see its beauty and rare creatures.

The country is rich in oil and minerals. These resources help Kazakhstan make money and grow. It also farms a lot, growing things like wheat.

250 Words Essay on Kazakhstan

Kazakhstan is a big country in Central Asia. It is the ninth largest country in the world. This nation is known for its beautiful nature and rich history.

Kazakhstan has many kinds of places, like mountains, deserts, and flat lands. It has long, cold winters and hot summers. The country is home to many animals and plants.

Lots of different people live in Kazakhstan. They speak Kazakh and Russian. The country is famous for its traditional music and dances. People there also enjoy sports, especially soccer and ice hockey.

Kazakhstan has a long past. It used to be part of the Soviet Union until 1991. When the Soviet Union broke up, Kazakhstan became its own country.

The country is rich in resources like oil and minerals. These resources help Kazakhstan make money and provide jobs for people. The nation is working to grow its economy and improve life for its citizens.

500 Words Essay on Kazakhstan

Kazakhstan is a large country located in Central Asia. It is the ninth biggest country in the world. This land has a rich history and is known for its beautiful landscapes that include mountains, flatlands, and lakes. Kazakhstan is also a place where many different kinds of people live together, sharing their cultures and traditions.

Geography and Climate

Kazakhstan has a lot of different types of places within it. There are huge areas of flat land called steppes, tall mountains like the Tian Shan, and even parts of the Caspian Sea. Because Kazakhstan is so big, the weather can change a lot depending on where you are. Some places are very cold, especially in the winter, while others can be quite warm.

People and Language

Government and economy.

Kazakhstan is a country that decides things through a government called a republic. This means they have a president and other leaders who help make important decisions. The country has a lot of natural resources, like oil and minerals, which help it make money. Farming is also important, with crops like wheat grown in the fertile lands.

Education and Cities

Education is a big part of life in Kazakhstan. Children go to school to learn many subjects, and there are also universities for higher education. The biggest city is Almaty, which used to be the capital. Now, the capital is Nur-Sultan, which was known as Astana before. These cities are modern and have many buildings, shops, and places to visit.

Culture and Traditions

Nature and wildlife.

The nature in Kazakhstan is beautiful, with places like the Altai Mountains and the Charyn Canyon. There are also many animals, such as eagles, wolves, and the rare snow leopard. People work to protect these animals and the natural places they live in.

Kazakhstan is a country with a lot to offer. It has a mix of old traditions and new ideas. The people are friendly, and there are many beautiful places to see. From its snowy mountains to its busy cities, Kazakhstan is a land of diversity and beauty that is worth learning about.

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Kazakhstan: Green economy of the future?

Kazakhstan is taking the lead among Central Asian countries by aspiring to make the leap to a green economy. Saule Ospanova sets out ten recommendations to help it on its way.

Kazakhstan's capital Astana will host the EXPO trade fair in 2017. Credit: Ken & Nyetta/Flickr (Creative Commons)

Kazakhstan has set itself a tough goal: it aspires to become one of the top 30 competitive developed countries in the world by 2050 while gradually 'greening' key economic sectors.

For an oil-producing country which has been in transition since the 1990s, Kazakhstan's ambitions present many opportunities. But moving away from a 'brown' economy to a green one also poses challenges.

In a new report published today , IIED assesses the situation in Kazakhstan and recommends ten ways the country can smooth the challenging transition to an economy that is not only green but also inclusive.

From the top down

Kazakhstan's Green Economy Concept policy, which it adopted in May 2013, emerged in response to the Rio+20 'Earth Summit' the year before. President Nazarbayev has since reaffirmed his government's commitment to mainstreaming the green economy agenda into national development, in a speech in January 2014.

The country aims to diversify the economy with alternative, cleaner sources of energy and will reform its agricultural and industrial sectors to spur scientific innovation and the use of advanced technologies.

Such strong government endorsement should stimulate economic drivers of green development. Of course, 'greening' the economy of an oil-producing resource-based country requires sustained political commitment, significant long-term investments and a range of other enabling conditions.

Our report is an effort to ask difficult questions and start discussing potential pathways and available options. It draws on earlier work in IIED's Caspian Energy Initiative as well as a green economy 'dialogue '  that IIED and the Kazakhstan Ministry of Environment organised in 2011.

Our recommendations

• Focus the green economy policy concept on specific sectors such as renewable energy, energy efficiency, water governance or waste management
• Assess the viability of the proposed investment mechanisms and ensure a wide variety of economic actors, not just the largest technology and infrastructure players, can access them
• Establish coherent measures to mainstream the green economy — such as a multi-stakeholder green economy forum, screening of public expenditure, green accounting
• Set up an inter-agency green economy coordinating body with a regulatory mandate, for example, a State Commission or a Council under the President ( the Sustainable Development Council offers lessons)
• Increase Kazakh institutional capacities and governance, to improve accountability and enable effective public oversight of the green economy programme
• Carry out fiscal reform to shift incentives from 'brown' to green economic activities, and towards inclusive approaches
• Review subsidies and other incentives, notably in the oil and gas, mining and agricultural sectors. Subsidies should address the social as well as the environmental impacts
• Ensure public finance accountability and oversight over new environmental programmes, for example by integrating Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative approaches into a wider range of economic activities
• Adopt a step-by-step approach in order to create dialogue and engagement with Kazakh industries and businesses — and a strong business case for the green economy concept.
• Develop a strong communication strategy to support policy breakthroughs in the short-to-mid-term, in order to promote investment in renewable energy, energy efficiency, water and waste management technologies.

Opportunities to learn and show progress

In the coming years Kazakhstan's progress towards a green economy will be on display in the following forums:

• The Green Economy Coalition is the world's largest multi-stakeholder network working on green economy, committed to accelerating the transition to a green and fair economy
• The Partnership for Action on Green Economy (PAGE) will support 30 countries over the next seven years to build national green economy strategies that will generate new jobs and skills, promote clean technologies, and reduce environmental risks and poverty. Progress around countries' green economy transitions, including Kazakhstan's, will be discussed at an upcoming first global PAGE conference in the United Arab Emirates in March 2014
• In 2017, Kazakhstan's new capital city Astana will host the international trade fair, EXPO . It has chosen the theme Future Energy, which aims to "promote and discover sustainable, energy solutions".

The target date of 2050 is just over 35 years away. The next few years will be crucial for laying the groundwork if Kazakhstan is to make a meaningful transition to a green inclusive economy by then.

Domestic support is essential, while international engagement can help to ensure that the process is more inclusive and brings benefits across Kazakhstan's population. New international financial and institutional instruments are also needed to support Kazakhstan's national endeavours to embrace a greener future.

Download the report: Assessing Kazakhstan's policy and institutional framework for a green economy

Saule Ospanova is an independent researcher working on sustainability and accountability initiatives in the extractive sector, as well as development of energy, water and climate change policies. ( [email protected] )

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About Kazakhstan | Geography

Nur-Sultan is located in the center of Kazakhstan in the dry steppe zone and in the grass steppe subzone. The area of the city stands above the flood plain of the Yessil River. The city has a climate similar to North and South Dakota with cold winters, beautiful springtimes and sweltering summers.

Nur-Sultan’s favourable location in the centre of the Eurasian continent makes it an economically advantageous transport, communication, logistics and financial center - a natural bridge between Europe and Asia and point of integration into the global economy for the region.

President Nursultan Nazarbayev made the decision to change the capital from Almaty to Astana in 1997. Astana was subsequently renamed Nur-Sultan in 2019.

Nur-Sultan - Then & Now

Important reasons and indicators drove the effort to move the capital North. Massive construction would spark the national economy and create a new epicenter for modernization, prosperity and job growth. Always looking to the future, President Nazarbayev recognized that Kazakhstan population was young, was growing, and would exceed current capacity of the fledging Republic. New and expanded cities would be needed to meet the coming demand for housing, jobs and services for foreign guests.

Several other reasons drove the move in 1997 Advantageous geopolitical location Considerable industrial potential Crucial resources for subsequent development of the construction industry Location in the largest transport junction Essential transport and telecommunication infrastructure Highly skilled urban workforce Large private sector Potentialities for entrepreneurship development Political and social stability Open land for development

The transfer of the capital to Nur-Sultan gave a powerful impetus to its economic development. The city’s high economic growth rates attract numerous investors. The share of Nur-Sultan in the overall volume of investments attracted to Kazakhstan accounts for 10 percent, while the Gross Regional Product of the city amounts to 10.2 percent.

The city is the largest business center in Kazakhstan.

Entrepreneurship is rapidly developing in Nur-Sultan. Today there are more than 128,000 small and medium enterprises in the city. 

Nur-Sultan is among the leading cities of the country in terms of the volume of construction. Ten million square metres of housing facilities have been built. Hundreds of companies from Kazakhstan and abroad took part in the construction of Nur-Sultan.

The architectural concept of Nur-Sultan was based on the idea of Nursultan Nazarbayev implying a special Eurasian style of Nur-Sultan should harmoniously combine the cultural traditions of both the East and the West. A well-known Japanese architect Kisho Kurokawa became the author of the general layout of the capital city.

Today Nur-Sultan, located in the heart of Eurasia, is a venue for numerous international forums, congresses and large scale international events. The Congress of Leaders of World and Traditional Religions, the Astana Economic Forum and other forums are held regularly in the city. In December, 2010, the historical Summit of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe took place in the capital city of Kazakhstan, after which it hosted the anniversary summits of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation and Organisation of Islamic Cooperation. In early 2011, the city welcomed the participants and guests of the 7th Asian Winter Games. In 2017, Nur-Sultan hosted the international specialized exhibition EXPO-2017.

The Akmolinsk outer military district was founded in 1832 on the banks of the Esil River, in the Qaraotkel woods. Until 1961, the name of this town was Akmolinsk (Aqmola in Kazakh), and because of its ideal location, it soon turned into a central point for trade livestock fairs. In 1961, the name was changed to Tselinograd, then to Aqmola in 1992. Astana was not the official name until 1998. In 2019, the capital was renamed to Nur-Sultan after the First President of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbayev.

In 1998, Nur-Sultan’s area was over 300 sq. km., but today, the city boundaries are rapidly expanding. Nur-Sultan’s population in 1998 was about 300,000. The population now exceeds 1.1 million and growing. The distance between Nur-Sultan and Almaty, the former capital, is 1,318 km.

City of the Future At Nur-Sultan’s historical inauguration ceremony, the President declared, “From now on any major decisions important for the future of the people will be made here in the centre of this colossal country. Now the heart of our motherland is beating here. Kazakhstan is making and defining its history and destiny here and today.”

In 1998, the decision was made to officially change the name of the new capital Akmola to Astana, (“capital” in Kazakh). A year later, the Astana from waterUnited Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) granted the status, “City of Peace,” to Astana.

The city’s rapid growth as the administrative and business center of the country matches the original concept for social and economic development. The theme of this concept is “The blossoming of Astana is the blossoming of Kazakhstan.”

More than 200 joint ventures and foreign companies are operating in the capital, including those belonging to:

• Switzerland.   Astana is a member of the International Association of Capitals and Cultural Cities of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS); it also has close bilateral relations with 13 cities and regions of the CIS.

The growth of Astana, as a result of it becoming the new capital, has had a powerful influence on neighboring industrial regions, such as:

• East Kazakhstan

The move has also supported the development of entrepreneurship and businesses which will, in turn, lead to the opening of foreign companies, firms, and major bank branches within the city of Astana.

Business Magnet

Astana is a major center of activity and the hub of national and international transport links. The extensive traffic is mainly due to strong economic ties between:

• South and Central Kazakhstan
• Western Siberia and the Ural region
• The Volga region and Central Russia.

Construction and the business of government have spurred investments in the local economy as well. Between 2000 and 2004, the number of new legal entities registered in the capital more than doubled, and the local housing stock nearly tripled in size.

The centers of the capital city’s economic activity are:

• Construction
• The food industry

The city boasts a growing number of restaurants and hotels that cater to business travelers. Major exhibition centers and universities, such as the L. Gumilyov Eurasian University, can be found within Astana. The A. Barayev Research Institute of Grain Farming is another establishment, not only famous in Kazakhstan but within the scientific world. In addition to the three museums, Astana also has branches of the Union of Writers and Artists of Kazakhstan, with over 40 newspapers and two literary magazines being published in the city.

Tourist Attractions

Astana’s tourist attractions include:

• Astana-Baiterek, a monument to the country’s independence with a sweeping view of the city
• An ethnic park
• A presidential culture museum
• The world’s most inland aquarium
• A 10,000-seat skating stadium and cycle track.

Additionally, Astana is fast becoming a mecca for sports tourism; new sport centers are planned for the neighboring areas of Korgalzhyn and Ereimentau.

Culture and the Arts

The Presidential Cultural Center of the Republic of Kazakhstan was established in the center of Astana. The structure of the Center includes a museum Cultural Centerwith various rooms and displays representing Kazakhstan’s past and present values. In addition, the Center has a library containing more than a million books and electronic catalogues.

The Kazakh National Music Academy has also been established in Astana. This Academy combines specialized and general musical education into one school. The Academy is a member of the European Association of Conservatories, Academies and Musical High Schools.

Spectators enjoy visiting theaters such as:

• The Theater of Drama and Music, named after K. Kuanyshbaev and opened on November 15, 1991
• The State Theater of Russian Drama, named after M. Gorky
• The National Opera and Ballet Theater, named after K Baiseitova and opened in Cinema City2000.

In addition to theaters, the pristine new cinema complex, Cinema-City, was opened in 2000. It was built in the tradition of international cinemas and has become a favorite of the people of Astana.

Eighth Wonder of the World

In September 2006, the inauguration of the Palace of Peace and Accord (62 meters in height), also known as the Peace Pyramid, marked another milestone in Astana’s evolution and may well become the Eighth Wonder of the World. Built to house the Assembly of Nations of Kazakhstan, a university, a museum, a library and a winter garden, the pyramid was designed by British architect Sir Norman Foster, who is famous for his futuristic glass roof on the German Parliament, the Reichstag.

Special Economic Zone

Construction of the new city developments on left bank of the Esil River has started. To aid in this process, the Special Economic Zone (SEZ), providing more favorable conditions for investment, has been created. According to the General Development Plan of the Capital, the integrated structure of this complex, located on the left bank, will symbolize the new capital.

The creation of the SEZ will provide many benefits to both the state and potential investors, including:

• State support of direct investments into construction of Astana city
• Significant tax privileges and preferentials
• Opportunities to introduce modern technologies and scientific achievements in the field of construction
• Land for construction in the new center of the capital
• Formation and development of the real estate market
• Guaranteed right to prolong the investment activity on the initial terms, until the expiration of the SEZ period. This cannot exceed ten years, irrespective of the changes in the juridical regime of the SEZ or its liquidation before the appointed time, including the extension of the area. 

The Customs regulation in the territory of the SEZ is applied in accordance to the customs legislature of Republic of Kazakhstan. The territory of the SEZ is considered to be a part of the customs-free territory of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

The following goods and equipment are customs-free:

• Machines and equipment for construction
• Goods that will be completely consumed in construction
• Goods and equipment necessary for construction.

The region around Astana is one of the Republic’s granaries and a large center of agricultural machine-building. In fact, it produces:

• One-fifth of all grain
• One-tenth of cattle-breeding products
• One-fourth of grain being sold to the country.

Land being used for crops constitutes 3,422.6 hectare (ha), a metric unit of area equivalent to 107,637 square feet. Other industries are thriving too, including:

• Cattle breeding
• Pig breeding
• Sheep breeding
• Horse breeding
• Poultry farming

Industry development within the region has most often been associated with agriculture, namely the processing of agricultural raw products. The region is fairly active in conducting foreign economic activities; it maintains mutually advantageous relations with many countries, including the major trade partners of:

Exported products to CIS countries, such as those listed above, are primarily:

• Milk products
• Imports from CIS countries consist of:
• Power resources
• Products of chemical industries
• Rolled stock of ferrous metals
• Consumer goods.

The remaining share of exports is shipped to non-CIS countries, such as:

• The United States
• These countries receive:
• Uranium oxide
• Fertilizers.

Imported products from these countries include:

• Food products
• Machinery for agro-industrial complex

In addition to agricultural products, there is also an abundance of mineral reserves, concentrated in the northern region of Astana. The most common are:

• Industrial diamonds
• In other areas, more deposits are found, such as:
• Caoline ores
• Quartz sands

Astana lies in the northern part of Central Kazakhstan. Its territory is approximately 96,800 sq. km. The surrounding landscape is far from uniform, as hills intermingle with low mountains, plains, and river valleys. In the North is found the Kokshetau summit; in the southern and south-eastern portions of the region is the Saryarka, part of the Kazakh topography; and plains compose the North-East.

The climate is sharply continental with aridity rapidly increasing to the South. The average temperature in January is -16° C, rising to 22° C in July. At the extreme, winter temperatures can reach - 40° C, and summer temperatures sometimes rise above 35° C, with dust-laden storms and hot dry winds.

The largest rivers in the area are the Ishim and the Nura. Lakes include:

• The Karasor
• The Korgalzhyn
• The Balyktykol
• The Kypshak

The region contains a vast variety of animals:

• 55 species of mammals
• 180 species of birds
• 30 species of fish.

The rarest species include:

• Pamir argali (arkhars)
• Saker falcons
• Golden eagles
• Demoiselle cranes
• Steppe eagles
• Dalmatian pelicans
• Little bustards

To protect rare disappearing species of animals, nature and game preserves have been established. Some 66 species of plants exist in the region, filling an area of 4,391.6 ha.

• Saturday, 7 September, 2024
• Almaty 55 °F / 13 °C
• Astana 52 °F / 11 °C

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Tokayev Reiterates Need for Industry Experts, Future-Oriented Professions

By Saniya Sakenova in Nation on 2 September 2024

ASTANA — President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev emphasized the need to address the critical shortage of experts in industries like water management, construction and energy, while also advocating for the training of specialists in future-oriented professions in his Sept. 2 address, reported Akorda.

Photo credit: Akorda

He underscored the importance of providing sufficient grant funding to domestic universities with educational programs that meet modern standards, ensuring high-quality education. He also noted the presence of 23 renowned foreign universities that have established themselves in Kazakhstan as part of the internationalization of higher education.

“The connection between the best universities and the real sector of the economy should be enhanced. It is crucial to synchronize innovation policy with the country’s scientific and technological priorities. This will drive industry innovations and unlock the potential of applied science in universities,” Tokayev said.

He cautioned against allowing international internships for scientists to become mere “academic tourism,” stressing that qualified personnel should be trained in universities and technical and vocational education organizations. Tokayev also suggested that the government should explore opportunities to integrate top-performing college graduates into industry-specific government positions.

Tokayev emphasized the importance of reforming vocational education and declared 2025 the Year of Vocational Professions, aiming to promote hard work and professionalism in society.

The President also highlighted the role of secondary education in strengthening the country’s human resource potential. As part of the Comfortable School national project, 217 modern schools will be constructed by the end of 2025, and 1,300 schools will undergo major repairs over the next three years.

He underscored the significance of early childhood education and school preparation, noting that parents share responsibility with the state in this area. To better support families in need and increase transparency in state assistance, Tokayev proposed linking per capita funding for preschool education to each family’s actual income.

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Yulia putintseva’s ball girl controversy has gotten ‘kind of scary’ after ‘3 second video’ at us open.

Yulia Putinseva offered more insight into her much-criticized actions after the Kazakhstan tennis star came under fire for how she treated a ball girl during her U.S. Open loss to Italy’s Jasmine Paolini on Saturday.

Putinseva earned boos from the crowd after staring at the ball girl before letting two balls bounce off her and previously apologized for how she handled the situation.

“Its kind of scary the way world can judge someone from just a 3 second video, that someone post from one side, without seeing the rest on what was really happening,” Putinseva posted with a photo of the interaction and another of her face during the moment. “I was just playing tennis and lost a tough game, which was very close (in my opinion) to turn that match around. After the game (as you can see on a pic) i got very much disappointed and was almost crying, that i didnt do better. At this time the girl was give me the ball, which i didnt even notice or so, because i was deep in my thoughts…

“I was not trying to humiliate her (or anyone) by not taking this ball that she was given to me. I didnt do anything disrespectful to anyone at this particular moment. I do apologize, if this girl thinks that it was something towards her. (And btw her name is Kate , very nice girl, which understood that it was nothing towards her).”

View this post on Instagram A post shared by Yulia Putintseva (@yulia_putintseva)

Putintseva became a villain of the 2024 U.S. Open after many felt she humiliated said ball girl.

The 29-year-old stood off to the side of the court swinging her club during her third-round match before the ball girl approached her.

The ball girl bounced the first ball toward Putintseva, who made no attempt to grab it before it hit her, and the tennis pro let the second bounced ball hit her foot, which earned her boos.

Ugly moment in the Putintseva vs Paolini match at the US Open. The ball girl tries tossing the ball and Yulia watches it bounce on the ground without moving. So many ball kids look up to these athletes. Let's try to treat them kinder. (via @MerThomp ) pic.twitter.com/WaVzNcbb6R — The Tennis Letter (@TheTennisLetter) September 1, 2024

She finally caught the third ball, while the boos intensified, before picking up one of the other balls and returning to the court.

Paolini ultimately bested Putintseva 6-3, 6-4.

Many criticized Putintseva for her actions, including German former World No. 1 Boris Becker.

“Who does Putintseva think she is …,” Becker posted on X . “Terrible behaviour towards the ball girl !!!”

Putintseva later apologized for her actions.

“I want to apologize to the ball girl for the way I was, when she was giving me balls,” Putintseva wrote in an Instagram Story. “Honestly speaking it was not about her.

“I was really pissed at myself by not winning the game from the break point and then got empty with my emotions and deep in my thoughts, that I was not even focusing on what’s going on and who gives me the ball… All the ball kids was doing amazing as always at the Open.”

In going into more detail with her post Wednesday, Putintseva hoped others could view the interaction in a different light and revealed she plans to make it up to the ball girl.

“I cant say, that i am perfect all my career. I am getting angry on court,pissed,saying stupid stuff and curse like no tomorrow sometimes😂 Guilty for that. But i did never put myself “on top” of someone. Thats just not me at all,” she posted. “Hope you guys can see it now from the different angle now. I mean ,i know that hates gonna hate and this message is getting way to long, so i am going to stop right here😅.

“And last thing , since Kate is already involved in this mess, i am trying to make something special for her🤫.”

Advertisement

From anxiety to action: How education can equip young people to address climate change

Mamta murthi, juergen voegele.

As temperatures soar and floods ravage communities in Mozambique, young people are not only threatened physically and economically, they are also grappling with an invisible enemy – climate anxiety. This anxiety isn't just about extreme weather; it's about an uncertain future. 

In interviews, students told us they worry that “some islands will cease to exist” and that “adults don’t understand.” One student said: “My mother believes that cyclones are a great snake that blows when she passes. I explain to her that cyclones are due to climatic phenomena, and that there are things we can do.” 

Eager to learn and take action

Mozambique is not an exception. Most adolescents around the world are experiencing deep anxiety about climate change.  Eighty-three percent of youth surveyed in eight low- and middle-income countries (Bangladesh, Kazakhstan, India, Angola, Tanzania, Colombia, Senegal, and China) report that climate change makes them terrified about the future. 

These young people are eager to learn more about climate change and take action to help, but many are not prepared with the knowledge and skills to do so. Nearly 88% of secondary school students in Bangladesh want to do something about climate change, but just 32% can answer basic questions about climate change correctly. 

Education can fill the gaps

A new World Bank report, Choosing our Future: Education for Climate Action , uses new data and analysis to understand the role education can play in responding to climate change, as well as the challenges climate change poses to education systems. It explores how education can help propel green transitions by addressing the information, knowledge, and skills gaps that hinder climate action, as well as the steps countries can take to adapt education systems to a changing climate.

As the new report shows, education has a key role to play in addressing climate change. It can combat misinformation and fill gaps in knowledge on climate challenges and solutions, a persistent problem. For example, only 7 percent of Ugandan Grade 8 students can answer a set of 6 basic climate change questions correctly. Education can solve this. It is the single strongest predictor of climate awareness.  Each additional year of schooling increases climate awareness by 8.6 percent, and the effect is larger in higher quality education systems. 

Education also has a vital role to play in fostering the skills needed for green transitions. Science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) skills associated with “traditional” green sectors, like energy, are critical, but analysis in the report shows that any job in any sector can become greener with the right set of skills. Moreover, green skills are increasingly demanded across a range of industries. In Brazil, for example, 25% of the skills demanded in online ads for jobs in the food and beverage industry are green skills like recycling and waste management. 

Investing in foundational skills

Building climate specific knowledge and green skills requires solid mastery of the basics. An investment in foundational skills is an investment in climate action. 

Rather than crowding out foundational skills, climate topics should be embedded in foundational lessons. This can be done by building climate curricula into existing topics, in ways that are understandable, accessible, and draw on local knowledge. For example, reading lessons can include examples of the benefits of preserving forests and math lessons can integrate lessons on temperature and sea level changes. Integrated classroom lessons can be supplemented with activities that integrate local knowledge and practical skills. In Morocco, an estimated six million students have participated in the One Student, One Tree, One School, One Forest project , learning about the environment by planting seeds and cuttings in their communities.

Governments have an important role to play. First by investing in quality foundational learning, alongside climate education. Second, by increasing the number of students who study STEM subjects, especially women and students from marginalized groups. Third, by recognizing that not all green skills are the same as STEM skills.

STEM skills are essential in the sectors that will be key to the transition and require deep changes in practices and technologies, like agriculture or energy. But any job can contribute to a green transition if workers have the right set of skills. Green skills demand is changing rapidly and jobs in diverse sectors are becoming greener with the evolution of tasks and skills. Governments should focus on improving information flows between employers and students and on increasing flexibility between academic and vocational studies. This can help young people to make informed decisions and respond to evolution in the labor market.

Addressing climate impacts to education

These investments will only pay off if education outcomes are protected from the impacts of climate change . As high temperatures and natural disasters become more common, schools face longer and more frequent closures, with each missed day setting back children's educational progress. 

Even when schools do not close, increasing heat erodes children’s learning. Adaptation investments such as planting trees and installing fans can head off these effects, and estimates in our report show that there are cost-effective options, as low as a one-time investment of US $18.51 per student. Cost-effective adaptation options explored in the report include solutions for temperature control, infrastructure resilience, remote learning during school closures and teacher training. The first two will help reduce the likelihood of climate-related school closures and all four will help minimize climate-related learning losses.

Youth have been at the forefront of climate activism, because they have the most at stake in the green transition. Education has an important role to play in facilitating and speeding that transition, and policy makers owe it to them to leverage education for climate action. 

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Consumption trends of antifungal and antiprotozoal agents for human systemic use in kazakhstan from 2017 to 2023.

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Semenova, Y.; Kussainova, A.; Kassym, L.; Aimurziyeva, A.; Semenov, D.; Lim, L. Consumption Trends of Antifungal and Antiprotozoal Agents for Human Systemic Use in Kazakhstan from 2017 to 2023. Antibiotics 2024 , 13 , 857. https://doi.org/10.3390/antibiotics13090857

Semenova Y, Kussainova A, Kassym L, Aimurziyeva A, Semenov D, Lim L. Consumption Trends of Antifungal and Antiprotozoal Agents for Human Systemic Use in Kazakhstan from 2017 to 2023. Antibiotics . 2024; 13(9):857. https://doi.org/10.3390/antibiotics13090857

Semenova, Yuliya, Assiya Kussainova, Laura Kassym, Ainur Aimurziyeva, Daniil Semenov, and Lisa Lim. 2024. "Consumption Trends of Antifungal and Antiprotozoal Agents for Human Systemic Use in Kazakhstan from 2017 to 2023" Antibiotics 13, no. 9: 857. https://doi.org/10.3390/antibiotics13090857

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Causes and Consequences of Kazakhstan’s Brain Drain

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Kazakhstani leaders understand the problem, but efforts to date have not achieved significant success. 

In recent years, the problem of brain drain has become a subject of great debate in Kazakhstan. The country has experienced a trend of negative external migration over the past decade.

According to the Bureau of National Statistics, as reported by Tengri News, 12,732 people left Kazakhstan in 2023. Although the reporting does not specify, presumably these are people who have decided to leave Kazakhstan for opportunities elsewhere, as opposed to those engaged in seasonal labor migration or leisure travel. Of the migrants reported in 2023, 9,948 of them left for Commonwealth of Independent State (CIS) countries, while the remaining 2,784 left for countries beyond the former Soviet Union.

In the January-March 2024 period, the number of people leaving the country was 3,785. Compared with the same period in 2023, the number of people leaving Kazakhstan increased by 42.1 percent.  

More detailed information from the Bureau of National Statistics and the Ministry of Labor and Social Protection would be necessary to analyze future trends in economic development and to what extent these departures qualitatively affect society. 

The term “brain drain” was first used in a report of the British Royal Society in 1962 regarding the emigration of scientists, engineers, and technicians from the U.K. to the U.S. It has been used to refer to the mass emigration of highly qualified specialists from developing countries to the developed world.

Returning to the 2023 figures cites above, almost every fourth person who left Kazakhstan had higher education, and every sixth person had secondary education. Most who left had a technical ( 2,809 ), economic ( 1,456 ), pedagogical ( 75 ), or legal ( 421 ) background. That is, they are people exactly in those specialties that Kazakhstan lacks. 

Kazakhstan’s labor market is experiencing a significant increase in demand since the beginning of 2024 . Employers are actively looking for workers in various fields, as is reflected in the number of vacancies posted on popular job search resources. According to the press service of HeadHunter Kazakhstan, more than 40,000 vacancies were posted in the first two weeks of January, twice as many as in the previous month. Overall, there is a high demand for various specialists in the Kazakhstan labor market, including auditors, lawyers, recruiters, purchasers, doctors, and teachers. Employers are willing to offer high wages to qualified specialists, especially in areas where there is an acute shortage of personnel. 

Moreover, the statistics cited above regarding those who left Kazakhstan in 2023 do not include the several tens of thousands of Kazakhstanis who live abroad for study or work. They may not be counted as leaving, but many probably have no plans to return home.      

Education in particular exerts a strong gravitational force on Kazakhstanis, drawing them away from the country. According to updated data from the UNESCO Statistical Institute, Kazakhstan sits in ninth place in the world in the number of students abroad ( 91,200 students).

The key incentives for Kazakhstani youth to go abroad to study are the perceived higher quality and prestige of foreign educational institutions, and, for some, ambition to secure employment and residence abroad. Not all those who travel abroad for education return to Kazakhstan, contributing to the “brain drain.”

In addition, every second Kazakhstani citizen who leaves is married, so families are leaving as well.      

Apart from the pull factors enticing Kazakhstanis to leave, such as economic opportunities, including better jobs, and higher standards of living, ecology also plays crucial role in pushing people to leave Kazakhstan. While low wages are often referenced as a critical factor contributing to the “brain drain” every year, more and more people are moving due to unfavorable environmental conditions. For example, in a ranking of the world’s most polluted cities in terms of annual average PM2.5 concentration in the 2017-2023 period by IQAir , Kazakhstan’s Karaganda ranked at 44th out of more than 7,000 cities in the ranking.  

The facts show that Kazakhstan is indeed facing a brain drain.  The state can work to counter this trend in several ways. 

First, the state must provide young people with decent education, work opportunities, and sufficient wages. The most important asset of any country is its people. The outflow of youth and educated people causes damage to Kazakhstan in the tens, hundreds, and millions of dollars – retaining Kazakhstanis in the country needs to be a priority.  

Second, the state needs to foster comfortable working conditions for specialists and afford opportunities for professional growth. 

Third, to retain young families in the country, there needs to be an available supply of affordable housing. 

Finally, the government and business leaders need to recognize environmental conditions as vitally important and commit to improving air quality. As Kazakhstan works on its energy transition, with the stated goal to become carbon neutral by 2060, the introduction of advanced technologies will be critical.

All of these steps are realistic and economically possible.  In some areas, Kazakhstan has already begun this important work. Kazakhstani leaders understand the problem, but efforts to date have not achieved significant success. 

In his 2022 State of the Nation Address, President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev emphasized  the development of technical and vocational education in the country, and issued a call for the involvement of large companies in this process within the framework of social responsibility.      

In Kazakhstan, as in many other countries, the level of wages varies significantly depending on different fields and experience of the employees. Today companies in technical sectors (electric power industry, mechanical engineering and metalworking, the fuel, automotive, and space industries) are willing to pay the highest salaries to retain their employees. The Ministry of Labor and Social Protection reported that as of 2023, the highest salaries were received by workers in the mining industry (an average of 692,000 tenge ), financial services ( 494,000 tenge ), and information and communications ( 447,000 tenge ).

There is hope that the “brain drain” trend may gradually change. Today, many international companies are moving from Russia to Kazakhstan, which implies the creation of jobs and demand for a workforce with appropriate qualifications.

Can Kazakhstan finally solve its brain drain problem? It’s hard to be sure. Young people are hardly inclined to analyze the differences between declared development programs, they are more likely to proceed from quite real and prosaic indicators: the standard of living and leisure, opportunities for self-realization with the education they receive, and opportunities to buy housing and maintain a family. In addition, it is necessary to understand that today the demands of the population and, first of all, young people also include accountability and transparency of the authorities, and a political arena that takes into account the views of every citizen. The development of digital technologies also provides people with access to the world, broadening their understanding of what is possible to achieve and the many possible places to live a good life.

Migration flows, the movement of populations, are a normal phenomenon. Almost all countries are involved in migration exchange in some fashion. And the outflow of well-educated and young Kazakhstanis depends on many factors. The number of people leaving the country is increasing, as stated above, but it is unknown whether that trend will continue into the future. One thing is clear, however: Kazakhstan’s government needs to continue working to ensure a comfortable life for all Kazakhstanis.

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Enhancing the Effectiveness of Kazakhstan’s Civil Service Through International Cooperation

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Human Rights Watch Report Highlights Unjustified ‘Financing Terrorism’ Restrictions in Kazakhstan

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Microsoft Research Forum

Quarterly Brief | September 2024

The Next Era of AI Research

Research advances are driving real-world impact faster than ever, with the latest advances in AI transforming the way we all live, work, and think.

In this episode, learn about the latest multimodal AI models, advanced benchmarks for AI evaluation and model self-improvement, and an entirely new kind of computer for AI inference and hard optimization. Discover how these research breakthroughs and more can help advance everything from weather prediction to materials design. Read more about this episode below, and register (opens in new tab) for the series.

“Today we are seeing so much AI research happening at the speed of conversation, to the point where even our top researchers feel that their heads are spinning, but working together, providing openness, providing greater access, we can see that we’ve made tremendous progress.” – Peter Lee, CVP, Microsoft Research & Incubations

@ the Forum

DIVE INTO OUR COLLECTION OF RESEARCH TALKS AND UPDATES

Keynote: Phi-3-Vision: A highly capable and “small” language vision model

Jianfeng Gao introduces Phi-3-Vision, an advanced and economical open-source multimodal model. As a member of the Phi-3 model family, Phi-3-Vision enhances language models by integrating multi-sensory skills, seamlessly combining language and vision capabilities.

Panel Discussion: Beyond Language: The future of multimodal models in healthcare, gaming, and AI

Microsoft researchers delve into the transformative potential and core challenges of multimodal models across various domains, including precision health, game intelligence, and foundation models.

Lightning talks & essays

Informative talks and thought-provoking essays from researchers across Microsoft about fundamental AI advances, the impact of AI on health and natural sciences, the intersection of AI and society, and more.

Analog optical computing for sustainable AI and beyond

Presented by Francesca Parmigiani and Jiaqi Chu

Direct Nash Optimization: Teaching language models to self-improve with general preferences

Presented by Corby Rosset

Project Aurora: The first large-scale foundation model of the atmosphere

Presented by Megan Stanley

A generative model of biology for in-silico experimentation and discovery

Presented by Kevin Yang

Fostering appropriate reliance on AI

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Research Forum is just a snapshot of the great work happening across the research community at Microsoft. Explore these links to learn more about the work of our researchers and their collaborators, the bold new ideas they’re exploring, and the impact they’ll achieve.

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