ASTANA (TCA) — Kazakhstan and China will implement 19 joint agricultural projects worth US $1.735 billion, Kazakhstan’s Deputy Agriculture Minister Gulmira Isayeva said on January 25, the official website of the Prime Minister of Kazakhstan reported.
“Our basic items for export to China are beef, lamb, and honey. On these items we are completing negotiations with China. We are preparing for the arrival of Chinese experts to check our enterprises in Kazakhstan in order to certify them, and we will start to supply animal products to China,” she said.
On January 25 the Kazakh Ministry of Agriculture and major Chinese companies such as CITIC, COFCO, Rifa Holding Group, and AIJIU signed an action plan to implement a number of projects in the production and processing of agricultural products in Kazakhstan for their further export to China.
According to the ministry, Chinese companies are interested in setting up joint ventures to process agricultural products (meat, oil, grain, tomatoes) in Kazakhstan.
A leading Chinese investment corporation, CITIC, intends to invest in the livestock sector of Kazakhstan, the Ministry of Agriculture said. The Chinese corporation will invest in construction of feedlots and poultry farms.
China’s COFCO will focus on production and processing of tomatoes in Kazakhstan. The company intends to work with Kazakhstan’s Eurasia Agro to invest in projects to develop a cluster for growing tomatoes and tomato products manufacturing.
China’s Rifa Holding Group will invest in construction of a meat-processing plant in the East Kazakhstan province, with annual capacity of 17 thousand tons of lamb and beef. Some 80 percent of products will be exported to China. Rifa Holding will have a 49-percent share in the project, the ministry said.
