Astana, 23 October. The Kurultai discussed the development of the e-APK single digital ecosystem, which will combine data on livestock, crop production, land resources and state support for agriculture; deputies asked for specific performance indicators for the system and clear deadlines for its introduction, Kurultai deputy Zamira Kuziyeva said.
The main task, according to the deputies, is to make digitalisation practically useful for farmers and agricultural producers, simplify access to public services and make management of the sector more effective.
The Ministry of Agriculture is building the e-APK platform on the instructions of the head of state and expects to finish it by 2028. It is to bring together all the sector's information systems and store data centrally. As the ministry sees it, the state will get a reliable analytical base on production, subsidies and investment, farmers easier access to services and financial instruments with less paperwork, and banks better opportunities to assess risk when lending. BI analytics, a system that turns data into reports and indicators for monitoring the sector and checking subsidies, is being built on the platform.
Before e-APK, the sector was digitalised through separate systems, the broadest of which by design is the Unified Automated Management System for Agro-Industrial Sectors (EASU), known as e-Agriculture. It includes the subsystems Veterinary Safety, Plant Quarantine — FITO, Plant Quarantine and State Registration of Agricultural Machinery; together with the Farm Animal Identification information system (ISZh), EASU provides traceability in livestock farming.
Other systems work alongside e-Agriculture. The Unified State Subsidy Information System (GISS), according to Deputy Minister of Agriculture Baglan Bekbauov, has been operating since 2023 and handles state support in 14 areas; rural lending runs through the Auyl Amanaty information system. In 2024 the ministry had four systems — ISZh, EASU e-Agriculture, GISS and Auyl Amanaty — and e-APK was then described as the final stage that would unite them all. They were later joined by crop traceability from seeds to sale of products, piloted in Akmola region, and the E-Fish system for fisheries; Minister Aidarbek Saparov listed GISS, ISZh, EASU and E-Fish among the systems being improved ahead of integration. Linking with satellite monitoring is meant to record actual sown areas and rule out inflated figures in subsidy claims.
In September the government set out the plan in more detail: launch crop traceability and agricultural land management systems within two years, modernise ISZh, and by the end of 2028 merge the sector's systems into a single platform with artificial intelligence and BI analytics.
What it means: The state is pulling scattered agricultural databases into one, above all to see where subsidies go. Deputies are unhappy that the project lacks clear performance indicators and deadlines.
Who benefits: The Ministry of Agriculture gets control over subsidies and analytics; farmers less paperwork if the system works as promised; banks data for assessing borrowers. Satellite monitoring is unwelcome for anyone who received subsidies for crops that were never sown.
Background: e-APK is conceived not as a replacement for EASU e-Agriculture and the other existing systems but as a platform that will unite them and store data centrally. Kazakhstan has declared 2026 the Year of Digitalisation, and according to Minister Saparov, the sector's key task this year is building e-APK.
List of sources used: Kurultai, Kazinform, EastFruit, BAQ.kz, e-CIS, DK, Agrosektor.kz
Artificial intelligence was used in preparing this material.
