Astana budget is 2.5 times the size of Minsk budget

Astana budget is 2.5 times larger than the budget of Minsk, Tengrinews.kz reports citing the President’s statement. “Astana’s budget in 2011 made 353 billion; the per capita value is equal to Prague. Astana’s budget is 1.5 times large than the one of Kiev and 2.5 times larger than the one of Minsk. This is the result of our work. While the city is only 12 years old,” Nazarbayev said at the meeting on further development of Astana. “National Geographic calls our capital the land of the future and the city attractive for searcher of success and opportunities: such evaluation is confirmed by the fact that 100 thousand people from 77 countries currently live in Astana. One of the most respective foreign agencies - the rating service of the Economist magazine - gave Astana the status of the city with good living standards among 140 countries,” Kazakhstan President noted. “All the achievements were made possible thanks to the dynamic development of the economy of the country and the city, active work of all Astana residents, city administration, present and previous, who worked around the clock to develop of our capital,” he said. The President said that according to the preliminary information, domestic regional product of Astana made 2 trillion tenge or $18 thousand per one citizen. Meanwhile, the whole country would be achieving this level by 2015-2020. “The industrial production increased by a quarter and investments into the fixed capital grew by one third. 1.5 million square meters of housing was built in 2011. Small and medium businesses, involving 40 percent of economically-active population, produced the goods totally worth almost 900 billion tenge ($6 billion). I.e. building our capital, we have not only spent the money on construction, but we have also built a hub that generates industrial goods and GDP for the whole country. This means that the money that we have invested a yielding an effective revenue,” the President said. By Renat Tashkinbayev