Astana, 28 October. In his annual address to the nation, "Kazakhstan's Current Tasks in a New Historical Cycle", President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev instructed the government to draw up an unprecedented Infrastructure Modernisation Plan and to allocate about 6.5 trillion tenge to it from the National Fund by the end of 2029, and proposed calling the nationwide building drive "Khalyqtyq Qurylys", or "People's Construction", Akorda reported.
The address was delivered at 11:00 Astana time live on national TV channels. It is the first annual address since the people adopted a new Constitution in March 2026: it took effect on 1 July, and the President described it as a sacred covenant between several generations that gave impetus to renewing the political system. Tokayev opened by noting that this year marks 35 years of independence, then described the world in which Kazakhstan must develop: false accusations and covert confrontation between countries, a crisis of trust among the major powers, and the declining authority of the UN and international law. In his words, such a complex and unpredictable situation did not exist even during the Cold War.
The President set out the economic basis for the programme in figures. According to the International Monetary Fund's forecast, Kazakhstan's GDP will approach $400bn this year, more than $19,000 per head, and the country will rise to 47th place in the world by size of economy. Manufacturing's share of GDP has exceeded 14%, and gold and foreign currency reserves together with National Fund assets exceed $130bn. In addition to 6.5 trillion tenge by 2029, 1.5 trillion tenge should be set aside to launch social projects this year and in the first two months of 2027. The President said he was deeply convinced that responsibility to future generations means not only leaving them savings in accounts but building and handing on a qualitatively new country, and stressed that a balance must be kept between saving and spending the National Fund, with every tenge spent bringing an economic and social return.
First, about 70 healthcare facilities will be built in the regions, including maternity hospitals, hospitals, ambulance stations, rehabilitation centres for children and gyms for children with special needs, and construction of about 50 education, sports and culture facilities will begin; substantial funds will go to housing and utilities, and gas and clean drinking water will be brought to many settlements, the President said. The government must prepare an initial list of projects covering all regions by the end of the year, and local small and medium-sized businesses are to be involved in construction. According to the President, the People's Construction programme will be the largest infrastructure project in the country's history and will employ hundreds of thousands of people.
A large section of the address dealt with transport. Next year the Bakhty — Ayagoz railway will open, increasing capacity on the border with China by 20 million tonnes; construction of the Aral — Caspian highway began in August and will shorten the Trans-Caspian route by about 1,000 km and cut delivery times by up to three days, the President recalled. About 85% of freight from China to Europe already passes through Kazakhstan, but in his view the country must become a full-fledged organiser of international freight flows. He named widening the Kokshetau — Petropavlovsk highway as the next task, and said reconstruction of all road border crossings must be completed next year. All the country's roads, both national ones, about 26% of the total, and local ones now run by regional administrations, are to be handed to the government in the person of the Transport Ministry. The President added that references to the quality of bitumen and crushed stone would not be accepted. He also demanded results from the private company Air Cargo, said airports in Zaisan, Katon-Karagai and Kendirli would open soon, and that next year construction of a new airport in Astana will begin with one of the world's largest companies. On digitising transport, he said that managing global transit flows with paper waybills in the age of artificial intelligence was absurd.
The President gave energy his harshest assessment. Kazakhstan produces 123 billion kWh, which for a country planning total digitisation and the construction of data centres is catastrophically insufficient; the task is to achieve a stable energy surplus by 2029 and update the single energy balance to 2035. The President criticised the long-standing practice of buying electricity from neighbours at high prices in winter and returning it cheaply in summer, recalled the abandoned construction of the Balkhash combined heat and power plant and said the commissioning of generating capacity in Turkestan, Kyzylorda, Almaty and Ekibastuz was now being delayed. On nuclear power, he proposed considering a state strategic uranium reserve, starting construction of the Balkhash nuclear power plant as early as next year and signing an agreement on comprehensive cooperation to start building the Moiynkum plant as soon as possible; offers to transfer expertise, he said, are coming from Russian and Chinese companies.
Relying on state money alone is unacceptable, or seeds of paternalism will be sown in the economy, the President warned, saying the logic of decisions is simple: state funds must serve as a guarantee for attracting private investment. The government was instructed to rebuild geological exploration as a high-tech industry, create a national system for managing reserves of critical metals with offtake contracts and submit proposals by the end of the year; the President questioned plans to build three more metallurgical plants in different regions when Qarmet is already operating. In agriculture, which grew by about 6% last year to output worth 15 trillion tenge, he called for long-term investment financing for farmers, rapid implementation of a list of food industry projects worth more than 500 billion tenge prepared by Baiterek, and production of domestic tractors and combines. Citing advice from NVIDIA chief Jensen Huang, he proposed introducing artificial intelligence in agriculture and ordered the completion of the water tariff reform and the National Water Resources Information System, saying water must be valued at its real cost.
The President proposed declaring next year the Year of Nationwide Large-Scale Construction: roads, airports, stations, hospitals, rehabilitation centres, creative centres, sports complexes, libraries and housing will be built and repaired in every regional centre, district and village. In his words, the nation's common answer to the coming age of artificial intelligence is to build, and build again, the Head of State said. Investment attraction, in his view, should be handled by a single centre, possibly the Baiterek holding, and for the city of Alatau he ordered the creation of an investment court based on the English common law model, with amendments to the constitutional law on its special legal regime to be submitted to the Kurultai by the end of January 2027.
For business, the President proposed that Kurultai deputies and the government discuss a new three-year moratorium on inspections of small and micro businesses from 1 January 2027: in the first half of the year violations by individual entrepreneurs fell by 34%, while the total of fines rose by almost 11% and unscheduled inspections increased tens of times. He also called for further decriminalisation of economic offences and targeted amendments to the new Tax Code, saying the code was neither dogma nor holy writ, and proposed discussing a higher tax rate for owners of large fortunes, stressing that nobody intended to restrict legally acquired assets. The Kurultai is to adopt a new Civil Code by the end of next year to replace the one in force since the 1990s. On the digital economy, he said two supercomputers have been launched, a third will start by the end of the year and a fibre-optic line has been laid along the Caspian seabed; the government must create a simplified legal regime for digital employment by the end of the year. He called inflation a silent enemy and told banks, whose assets exceed 75 trillion tenge and deposits 52 trillion tenge, to lend more actively to the economy.
The President proposed a fundamental review of social policy: only families in genuine need should receive assistance, and, he said, imaginary kindness to people at the budget's expense is real populism; new forms of social assistance are to be tested in pilot mode first. From 1 January 2027 the minimum wage will rise from 85,000 to 110,000 tenge, affecting 1.8 million people, including more than 370,000 public sector workers, and pay for primary care district staff will rise by up to 40% depending on length of service. The first stage of construction includes eight perinatal centres, seven multi-specialty children's hospitals in Atyrau, Aktobe, Almaty, Shymkent, Kaskelen, Semey and Aktau, and two more medical facilities in Astana. The Presidential Administration is to prepare a document with a long-term vision of the country's development within a year, and a comprehensive plan for public administration reform by 1 June 2027. Closing his speech, the President named the common goal as building a Just, Strong, Clean and Progressive Kazakhstan.
What it means: The President is turning the National Fund from saving to a major building drive: 6.5 trillion tenge by 2029 for hospitals, schools, gas, water, roads and power plants, on condition that state money guarantees private investment rather than replacing it. His harshest words concerned roads, energy and social policy: he named delayed projects and called indiscriminate payments populism; the decisions people will feel most are a minimum wage of 110,000 tenge from 1 January and the discussion of a new moratorium on business inspections and a tax on large fortunes.
Who benefits: Residents of regions that will get hospitals, schools, gas and water, if construction proceeds as promised. Local small and medium-sized businesses, which the President proposed involving as contractors, and the construction industry as a whole. The Transport Ministry, which takes over all the country's roads. The 1.8 million workers whose pay will rise to the new minimum, and small business if the inspection moratorium is introduced; owners of large fortunes face a discussion of a higher tax rate. Spending from the National Fund reduces savings for the future, which is why the President insisted on a balance between saving and spending; how it will be ensured will become clear from the government's plan.
Background: Between 1997 and 2025, 31 addresses to the nation were delivered in Kazakhstan: 23 by Nursultan Nazarbayev and 8 by Kassym-Jomart Tokayev; this one is Tokayev's ninth and the first under the new Constitution, which enshrined the annual address. How the tradition grew and changed, from the reports of ancient rulers to Kazakhstan's addresses, is told with historical photographs, videos of earlier addresses and interactive charts in the VRK News longread "From Clay Cones to an Address to the Nation". A full analysis of the address as a phenomenon, with a matrix of genre features, scenarios and recommendations, is in the study "An Address to the People: the Genealogy, Mechanism and Fate of a Genre".
We have also reported that the Ekibastuz heat and power plant enters winter after repairs with 90% fewer outages and that gas is promised to the north by 2030 by extending the Saryarka pipeline, and this morning examined 4,400 years of rulers addressing society, from clay cones to the address to the nation.
