Prime Minister of Kazakhstan Askar Mamin took part in the opening of the forum "Digital Almaty 2021: Digital Reset: The Leap to the Next Normal.’’

The forum began with welcoming video messages from the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev and the President of the World Economic Forum Børge Brende. Google Vice President Vint Cerf spoke online.

The plenary session of the forum was attended by the Prime Ministers of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, Belarus — Roman Golovchenko, Kyrgyzstan — Ulukbek Maripov, Russia — Mikhail Mishustin, Uzbekistan — Abdulla Aripov, Chair of the EEC Board Mikhail Myasnikovich, co-founder of Kaspi.kz Mikhail Lomtadze and Chair of the Board of Directors of ERG Alexander Machkevitch.

Speaking at the plenary session of the forum, the prime minister of the Republic of Kazakhstan noted that in the context of the pandemic, the economy of Kazakhstan showed a high level of stability, which is largely due to the growing penetration of digital solutions into all areas of the public and private sectors.

“Despite the obvious limitations, we accelerated our efforts to improve the availability and quality of digital infrastructure. In 2020, a PPP project for the construction of 20 thousand fiber-optic communication lines was completed. More than 1,000 mobile base stations have been installed, which has significantly reduced the level of technological inequality in the regions. As a result, coverage of the population of Kazakhstan with the Internet today is 99%,” Mamin said.

The head of government noted that the opportunity for citizens of the Republic of Kazakhstan to remotely obtain an electronic digital signature (EDS) through remote identification by biometrics of a person has been implemented. Projects such as cloud workflow, mobile workplace, online approaches to HR administration and social benefits are being actively implemented. The share of public services available online was increased to 93%.

As a result, in 2020, Kazakhstan ranked 29th among 193 countries in the UN rating for the level of e-government development, moving up 10 positions.

The volume of e-commerce in the structure of retail trade in the past year increased almost 3 times — from 3.8% to 9.7%. The volume of non-cash transactions of the population increased 2.5 times, from 14.1 trillion tenge to 35.3 trillion tenge.

“The Head of State Kassym-Jomart Kemelevich Tokayev, ordered that the current year pass under the sign of effective digitalization of our state. Today we are already working on the deep integration of the principles of big data into the work of government agencies. Collection and processing of data within the framework of the concept of data-driven government will become a factor in improving the quality of public services at all stages, from development to monitoring efficiency,” Mamin said.

The prime minister noted that as part of the development of digital infrastructure over the next 5 years, all regional centers and cities of republican significance of the Republic of Kazakhstan will be provided with 5G coverage. Investments in the field of data processing and storage will increase 6 times (from 82 billion to 500 billion tenge). The share of e-commerce will be doubled.

“Thanks to the measures to support business in the digital industry, more than 1,000 innovative companies will be created, which will lead to an increase in the volume of ICT exports by more than 25 times. About 100 thousand new jobs will be created in the IT industry, which will help form a critical mass and launch multiplier effects in all sectors of the economy,” Mamin said.

The forum participants got acquainted with the exhibition of digital projects of Kazakhstan in the areas of public services, fiscal data analytics, as well as financial, banking and telecommunications sectors.