The Eurasian Development Bank’s annual investment in Kazakhstan’s economy has exceeded $1bn for the second consecutive year, the chairman of its management board Nikolai Podguzov said during a February 12th meeting with Kazakhstan’s president Kassym-Jomart Tokayev.
The Eurasian Development Bank (EDB) is an international financial institution with member states including Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Tajikistan. The bank’s investment in 2022 and 2023 amounted to $4.2bn, with the share of Kazakhstan-based projects in the bank’s portfolio steadily increasing and reaching 59% by the end of 2023.
The value of potential EDB projects under consideration for Kazakhstan for 2024 exceeds $3.5bn. These investments are planned for the country’s strategically important sectors such as transport infrastructure, thermal and renewable energy, industrial production, agriculture, and water management.
Podguzov emphasized that this year the EDB intends to foster the growth of Kazakhstan’s financial market, including the implementation of new instruments to fund infrastructure projects.
He also informed Tokayev about the EDB’s research on the Central Asian water and energy complex. Podguzov said that his bank plans to promote the advancement of Kazakhstan as a driver of efficient water use, and stands ready to offer grants totaling up to $10m to develop regional centers of expertise in water conservation and energy-efficient technologies – and to allocate up to $400m for projects involving digital water-metering technologies, laser land levelling for irrigated areas and the establishment of a regional production and service cluster for state-of-the-art irrigation equipment.
