Investors Need Cheap Electricity

A group of deputies of the Senate of the Parliament of the Republic of Kazakhstan headed by Chairman of the Committee for Economic Policy, Innovative Development and Entrepreneurship Askar Beisenbayev arrived with a two-day working visit to Pavlodar Oblast. In Ekibastuz, the senators have visited several enterprises of the railway cluster and a greenhouse for growing roses. In addition, guests from Astana have visited Ekibastuz HEPP-1 named after B. Nurzhanov. There was an exit session of the deputy committee, during which they discussed the further development of the electric power industry. The Akim of Pavlodar Oblast shared with the deputies plans on the creation of industrial zone around Ekibastuz power stations.

 

“To date, investors are more attracted not by tax preferences, but by cheap electricity,” – Bulat Bakauov said. – “Therefore, we have already prepared land plots around our stations, so that potential investors had the opportunity to receive electricity not through KEGOC lines, but from the bus. In addition, we have provided funds from the regional budget for the design of a 500 Megawatt substation. The preliminary cost of this project will be about KZT10-12 billion. We ask to support this project when considering at the republican level and are ready to co-finance it from the local budget.”

In addition, the Head of the Oblast raised a problem for the residents of Pavlodar, SEZ before the deputies. The fact is that all participants of the special economic zone can import goods to the territory of their enterprises without VAT. However, when the movement of products takes place within the SEZ, they cannot expect this benefit. Thus, when, for example, Guissenhaus, LLP releases alloyed aluminium from KiK, LLP, which produces light alloy car disks from this raw material, a standard value-added tax is imposed on it. As it turned out, this legal gap is already being considered at the legislative level. The senators have promised to take this issue to the attention and in the near future to consider it in more detail in the Parliament.