Kazakhstan Very Keen To Beef Up Exports To Malaysia

By Santhia Panjanadan KUALA LUMPUR, June 4 (Bernama) -- Kazakhstan’s National Export and Investment Agency, Kaznex Invest, is very keen to beef up exports to Malaysia in halal products, particularly in agriculture, grains as well as flowers, says Deputy Chairman of the Board, Kairat Karmanov. "In the last five years, the total trade between Malaysia and Kazakhstan was almost half billion US dollars, of which 99 per cent were imports from Malaysia, mostly in chemical engineering and agriculture. "We are very much interested in the Malaysian market, therefore we want to increase our exports to Malaysia," he told Bernama. He said the republic has identified 20 priority countries for foreign direct investment (FDI), including Malaysia which reflected the importance to increase trade and cooperation between both nations, more so after the official visits by the countries' leaders. Kaznex Invest was set up by Kazakhstan Ministry of Industry and New Technologies to help diversify its economy by encouraging exports of products from outside the natural resources sector, and to attract FDI to priority sectors of the economy. He said Malaysia has the aspirations to become the world’s premier halal hub offering a complete range of products and services as a modern Islamic country. Kazakhstan, being an Islamic nation, certainly is very much interested to export halal products as well as further attract FDI in the halal industry. "Kazakhstan is the ninth largest country in the world and we have vast fields of grain and we are the number one flower exporter in the world. "This a niche market for the Malaysian business community as well as for us to beef up exports to your country," Kairat added. In the last 20 years, the landlocked country had only attracted US$3 million from Malaysia with only US$900,000 remained in Kazakhstan while US$2.3 million of Kazakhstan's investment went to Malaysia, he said. “We would like to invite more companies from the processing industries, be it oil and gas refinery, chemistry, methodological or processing of agricultural products, as well as from the ICT (Information and Communications Technology) sector as Malaysia is very famous for IT,” he said. “We have a lot to learn from Malaysia in terms of economic zones such as Iskandar Malaysia and Cyberjaya. “Kazakhstan has nine special economic zones, so we would like to invite Malaysian companies, particularly the managing companies of Malaysian economic zones to our zones to share their experience and knowledge on how to manage,” he added. Kairat said Kazakhstan always looked at Malaysia as a role model for development not only in the investment field. -- BERNAMA