World exhibition EXPO-2015 has opened on May 1 in Milan with the participation of top officials of the country. Kazakhstan is taking part in the exhibition. It organized its pavilion in the national style – folk musicians welcome visitors with Kazakh songs and instrumental compositions, guests are treated with mare's milk, told of the history of the country and its traditions.
World exhibition EXPO-2015 has opened on May 1 in Milan with the participation of top officials of the country. Kazakhstan is taking part in the exhibition. It organized its pavilion in the national style – folk musicians welcome visitors with Kazakh songs and instrumental compositions, guests are treated with mare's milk, told of the history of the country and its traditions.
Volunteers and Kazakh artists will stay in the pavilion for the duration of the entire exhibition – until October 30, 2015. The pavilion occupies two thousand square meters from the total area of the EXPO-2015 exhibition in Milan that is over a million square meters.
A Tengrinews correspondent spoke to the head of the press service of National Company Astana EXPO-2017 Aigul Mukei, who is in Milan.
She said that the construction of EXPO-2017 facilities in Astana used products of 71 Kazakhstani companies worth a total of 13.6 billion tenge. 55 companies from Astana were supplying materials worth 7.6 billion tenge ($41 mln), 11 enterprises from Karaganda Oblast – worth 4.6 billion tenge ($25 mlm). There is one company from North Kazakhstan Oblast, two from Pavlodar Oblast, one from South Kazakhstan Oblast and one from East Kazakhstan Oblast among the suppliers.
"Another 14 Kazakhstani enterprises supply their products for the construction outside of memorandums totaling about one billion tenge. In particular, the enterprises are from Akmola and Almaty Oblasts and Almaty city," Mukei added.
Earlier, entrepreneurs raised concerns that domestic building materials were not used in the construction of facilities for the upcoming exhibition in Astana. In particular, as was indicated in the February report of the Kazakhstan Association of Autoclaved Aerated Concrete Producers, large-format ceramic blocks for EXPO-2017-related construction were purchased from St. Petersburg instead of Kazakhstani producers.
Nevertheless, the press service of Astana EXPO-2017 said that this information was inaccurate. And explained that one of the main requirements in the design of the EXPO-2017 facilities was use of materials with local content.
Reporting by Roza Yessenkulova, writing by Dinara Urazova