The Independence Palace hosted the 32nd Plenary Session of Foreign Investors Council (FIC) chaired by the RoK President Kassym-Zhomart Tokayev. The session was dedicated to the Human Capital Development. This event was attended by heads of foreign businesses, over 300 heads of state authorities and representatives of international organizations.
In a welcome speech to participants of this dialogue platform the Head of State reminded that FIC was founded more than 20 years ago by the First President of Kazakhstan, Elbasy Nursultan Nazarbayev to improve the national investment climate. Such meetings allow to create a direct dialogue between the national Government and foreign businessmen.
Kasym-Jomart Tokayev stated that FIC members had made a significant contribution to the development of Kazakhstan's economy in the form of foreign direct investments equal to 320 billion US dollars.
Kassym-Zhomart Tokayev, President of the Republic of Kazakhstan:
Presently the economic situation in the world remains unstable due to growing financial and trade sanctions. As a result, global economic growth forecasts are deteriorating. According to the OECD report, last year the total amount of foreign direct investments in the world has shrunk by 27 percent or to 1.1 trillion dollars. In this difficult situation, Kazakhstan has been able to maintain a stable inflow of foreign investment. Last year the total amount exceeded $24 billion representing a 16% growth if compared to 2017. All this has become possible thanks to our joint efforts and productive work.
In the course of the session the participants of the 32nd Plenary Session mentioned below gave their speeches: the President of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development Sir S. Chakrabarti, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Kazakhstan B.B. Atamkulov on the implementation of protocol minutes of the 31st Plenary Session of the Council, the Chairman of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Kazakhstan Zh.K. Asanov, the Minister of Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan A.K. Aimagambetov on the main topic of the session, the Governing Board Chairman of the Kazakhstan Foreign Investor’s Council Association A. Preimanis on recommendations to the Foreign Investor’s Council, CEO, Royal Dutch Shell plc - Ben van Beurden, President of the Supervisory Board, Polpharma - Jerzy Starak, Chairman, President & CEO of Baker Hughes, a GE company - Lorenzo Simonelli, Chairman of the Board of Directors, ERG - Alexander Machkevitch, President, Total Exploration & Production - Arnaud Breuillac, Deputy Chairperson, Baker McKenzie International and Member, Global Executive Committee - Constanze Ulmer-Eilfort, Vice-President of China National Petroleum Corporation, President of PetroChina Company Limited - Hou Qijun, Chief Executive Officer, Deutsche Bank AG, Regional Management for Central and Eastern Europe - Joerg Bongartz, President, ExxonMobil Global Projects Company - Neil W. Duffin, President Eastern Europe Region, Philip Morris International - Marco Mariotti.
In conclusion, the RoK President proposed to devote the next FIC plenary session to the development of non-resource export.
Reference:
Established at the initiative of the First President N.A. Nazarbayev the Foreign Investors Council (FIC) is an effective platform for brining together major foreign investors in Kazakhstan and providing an opportunity to discuss the most important issues related to the development of the national economy and improvement of the investment climate. FIC includes heads of 37 large-scale transnational companies and international organizations as well as heads of key ministries.
