Kazakhstan hoping to enter WTO in 2014

Kazakhstan plans to enter the WTO in 2014, a href="http://en.tengrinews.kz" target="_blank">Tengrinews reports, citing Ms. Zhanar Aitzhanova, Minister for Economic Integration, as saying. “We are still negotiating over subsidies to the country’s agriculture. Accession is only possible after we have agreed on the amount of subsidies in line with Kazakhstan’s mid and long-term plans. Hopefully, it will happen next year”, Ms. Aitzhanova told reporters following her speaking in the country’s Majilis (lower chamber). “These negotiations are rather complicated. We will be working on technical documents related to accession after they are over”, she added. “The Government is negotiating over the size of subsidies to the country’s agriculture. The task is to make sure these subsidies are sufficient to ensure further development of the agriculture in the years to come”, she said. In the country’s Majilis she told that Kazakhstan was at the final stage of negotiations with the EU to agree on the maximum export duty to be levied by Kazakhstan following the entry into the WTO. She elaborated that currently Kazakhstan was levying a duty on 206 types of commodities, including oil, petroleum products, ferrous scrap, aluminum, wool, animal skins. “We have agreed that the duty rates would be kept at that level after the accession. When it comes to crude and petroleum products, Kazakhstan will be able to further raise the duty rates”, she said. According to her, export duties secure Kazakhstan $2.9 billion a year, with $2.8 of them being duties on petroleum products. When speaking in the Majilis, she elaborated that Kazakhstan voiced its intention to enter the WTO back in 1996. In the same year the nation obtained an observer status within the organization.