Book chapter: "A Frontier Market in the COVID-19 Era: Kazakhstan’s Economic Diversification in the 2020s"

 

"A Frontier Market in the COVID-19 Era: Kazakhstan’s Economic Diversification in the 2020s"

Wilder Alejandro Sanchez

 Chapter published in: 

Jean-François Caron and Hélène Thibault (Eds), Central Asia and the Covid-19 Pandemic, Springer Link, 2022: 139-170

 

To buy the book please visit: https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-981-16-7586-7

 

More info on my chapter: https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-981-16-7586-7_7

Abstract

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the government of Kazakhstan was carrying out a strategy of economic diversification in order to decrease the country’s dependence on its profitable energy industry which constitute the bulk of Kazakhstan’s exports. As part of the diversification of its economy and trading partners, Kazakhstan has a long-term objective: become one of the world’s 30 most developed economics by 2050. The Central Asian nation is classified as a frontier market by global indexes, which means that it is viewed as having less developed political and economic structures, which makes them more volatile. However this label can be misleading as it does not properly demonstrate what Kazakhstan has accomplished in recent years in its quest to attract new trade partners and investors. New entities like the Astana International Financial Centre; the government's plans to become a trilingual nation; and recent initiatives to develop industries like agriculture, banking, manufacturing and tourism; demonstrate what good planning can accomplish. How will the pandemic affect Kazakhstan’s plans and objectives? This essay seeks to demonstrate that the country has handled COVID-19 generally well from an economic point of view. While the informal sector and lack of development in the periphery remain problematic issues, Nur-Sultan has achieved much in its three decades of independence as a frontier market, transforming from a Soviet-style to a Western-style economy. Kazakhstan, thus, is an example of how a global pandemic does not necessarily have to cripple the development plans of a frontier market, if said country has clear short-term as well as long-term goals.