Bastau Business is all about employment provision – PM

Bastau Business has been running for three years now, covering 15 thousand persons and 28 thousand persons with training in 2017 and 2018 respectively. The project started in a pilot mode in 2016 following the presidential order regime giving people an opportunity to run their own businesses. This year the programme is expected to cover 75 thousand persons, while 15 000 businesses are expected to be opened, the correspondent of the Strategy2050.kz Information Agency informs.

As of today, there are 250 Business Bastau classes across the country.

As part of the project 35 billion tenge in the form of microloans have been given, while items worth 50 billion tenge have been produced.

During the early stages of the project, agriculture accounted for 80%. 2019 sees agriculture account for 42% and services for 58%, showing that urban citizens are also getting engaged in the programme.

93% of those running own businesses pay taxes totalling at 620 billion tenge.

“120 hours of consultations coupled with 40 hours of practice make up the programme”, Ablay Myrzakhmetov, Chairman of the Atameken National Chamber of Entrepreneurs, said at the government session.

He went on to say that grants valued at 18 billion tenge have been allocated under the Bastau Business project largely available for young persons, families with many children.

“Bastau Buisness gives an opportunity to start a business in rural areas”, he concluded.

According to Birzhan Nurymbetov, Minister of Labour and Social Protection of Population, entrepreneurship support is one of the focuses of the Enbek State Programme.

“To promote entrepreneurship among unemployed and self-employed persons, youth, disabled persons, the Programme provides for the following mechanisms: to teach the basics of entrepreneurship, provide soft microloans, guarantee microloans, give grants for carrying out business ideas”, Nurymbetov said.

In the period between 2017 and 2019, 176 billion tenge has been provided from the national budget for microloans. 83 billion tenge is slated for allocation this year.

60% of the total microloans are directed to startup projects, 33% to business expansion, 7% to anchor cooperation development, according to the labour minister. He also said that those received microloans have created 8 384 new jobs.

By economic activities in rural areas 80% of the total microloans are found in livestock, 9.6% in services, 6% in transport and 2.7% in crop production, while in urban areas commerce accounts for 30%, manufacturing for 15% and construction for 13%.

“Those microloans are mostly given to self-employed persons (74%), unemployed persons (22%), disabled persons (1.5%) and low-income families (1.5%), of them 15% are young persons and 34% are women”, Nurymbetov said.

In Finance Minister Alikhan Smailov’s words, the public procurement rules are being amended as items will be procured only through competitions coupled with pre-qualification.

“19 April 2019 saw the amendments have been made to the law on public procurement. So, by the Presidential order the Government is free to determine the persons to carry out public procurements from the same source”, he said.

Starting in 1 July 2019 public procurements of furniture, items of light industries are carried out among local producers, with the presence of the industrial certificate is the key measure for selecting suppliers.

In construction there are support measures in place. Model agreements on public procurements are worked out as well as on design estimates allowing for the use of construction materials included in the registry of local producers.

Starting in 1 January 2020 the same support measures will be envisaged in services related to creation and development of informatization facilities, software and electric items.

“To meet the Head of State’s task centralization of public procurements is about to be piloted in 2020, implying transfer of all the public procurements to single organizers at appropriate levels”, Smailov said.

According to him, the measure is believed to cut down the number of organizers, simplify administration and efficiently regulate local content

“Bastau Buisness, Zhas kasipker, microloans are all about employment provision, which is one of the main tasks given by the Kazakh President. This year alone has seen 5000 citizens open their own businesses, creating 8 500 jobs. People with support of the State start their own businesses and are no longer dependent on help and allowances”, Kazakh Prime Minister, Askar Mamin, said.

He directed the Ministries of Labour and Social Protection, National Economy together with Atameken review the situation on the Bastau Business project within 2 weeks, microloans and make proposals.

“The Atameken National Chamber of Entrepreneurs and the Ministries of Labour and Social Protection, Agriculture need to work on expanding the number of Bastau Business participants engaged in doing business from 20% to 30%”, the PM added.

Speaking of local content, the PM reminted that all the necessary legislative amendments have been made.

“First, I instruct the Governors of the regions to adopt measures to meet the set indicators on local content. Second, the application of the industrial certificate and CT-KZ is insufficient, thus the Governors need to ensure the requirements are met. Third, I warn the Ministry of Finance to take into consideration SME support mechanisms when designing the rules for procurement by quasi-sector subjects and ensure they are adopted within one month”, he concluded.

Adlet Seilkhanov