The most competitive countries in the world are characterized by the same feature – a developed business sector, which consists of citizens' initiative and state support. In this regard, the development of entrepreneurship is given special attention in Kazakhstan, since according to the instructions of the Head of State, the main strategic goal of the country by 2050 is to enter the top 30 of the most competitive countries. 

The Government has a specific task to increase the share of SMEs in the country's GDP to 50% by 2050.

According to statistics, as of September 1, the entrepreneurial activities in the country carried out by 1,158,680 SMEs, where more than 3 million people are employed. They have produced output worth over 4 trillion tenge. Compared with the same period of the last year, there is an increase in the number of SMEs by 6.3%.

It is commonly known that excessive administration is one of the major barriers to the development of SMEs. Today, the government has taken a clear course to reduce the control and oversight functions of government agencies.

As a result of the audit, it was proposed to exclude a number of spheres of control and supervision, to reduce about half of the requirements for business verification. At the same time, 85% of requirements have been reduced only in the sphere of sanitary and epidemiological welfare of the population, and 72% of requirements in the sphere of fire safety. It is also proposed to exclude duplicate and non-risk-related security threats to the state and the consumer 165 out of 540 control and supervisory functions of state bodies with revision and optimization of their staff.

The articles and the competence of authorized bodies to initiate administrative cases on 30 articles of the Code of Administrative Offenses will be deleted, and an institute for preventive control shall be introduced. In general, the measures taken to reform the state control and supervision will reduce the number of inspections by 30% until 2018.

It should be noted that a large-scale audit of licensing documents issued by monopoly enterprises and quasi-state enterprises was carried out with subsequent legislative regulation of such permits.

At present, a list of permits issued by such enterprises have been made, which consists of 69 permits. The given list will be exhaustive and will be fixed by the application of the law "On Permits and Notifications".

In May 2016, the law "On Self-Regulation" was put into effect. The by-laws have been adopted and all conditions for the introduction of the institution of "self-regulation" in the sectors have been created. Legislation regulates the conditions for the establishment of self-regulatory organizations whose activities will be aimed at improving the quality of goods and services produced, as well as ensuring the responsibility of producers to consumers.

In some areas, voluntary self-regulatory organizations already operate (environmental audit, bookmaking, tax advisers, fire safety).

It should be noted that a decision has already been taken to introduce mandatory self-regulation in the valuation activities and activities of environmental auditors. It is also planned to introduce compulsory self-regulation in the legal, notarial, audit spheres and in the activities of the non-departmental complex expertise of construction projects.

Doing Business Rating: Mirror reflection of the Reforms

Thanks to the work carried out by the Government, Kazakhstan has significantly improved its positions in various international ratings. For example, according to the results of the Doing Business rating, Kazakhstan in 2016 ranked 35th among 190 economies, while increasing its rating by 16 positions. The World Bank Group noted that the reforms carried out by Kazakhstan greatly facilitate the conditions for business in the country.

In order to continue work in this direction, in the first quarter of 2017 a new package of legislative initiatives aimed at improving Kazakhstan's position in the rating of ease of doing business was adopted. In particular, the amendments are aimed at protecting the rights of minority investors, simplifying procedures in the field of taxation, obtaining loans, obtaining a building permit, within the framework of which it is provided for the possibility for SMEs to simultaneously conclude contracts with banks and insurance organizations, and also register for VAT, simplified the procedure for filing a lawsuit to the court, the requirements for the production of a technical passport for new construction projects have been abolished.

In addition, a draft Law "On Amendments and Additions to Certain Legislative Acts Regarding the Improvement of Business Regulation" has been developed and submitted to the Government.

Government support for SMEs

In general, for the integrated support of entrepreneurship in the country there is a unified program of business support and business development "Business Roadmap–2020", which is aimed at the development of regional private entrepreneurship and competitiveness.

Since the implementation of the BRM-2020, 341.3 billion tenge has been allocated from the republican budget, of which 308.7 billion tenge are for financial support, including 30 billion tenge within general transfers and 31.8 billion tenge at the expense of the National Fund of the Republic of Kazakhstan .

As of September 1 of 2017, more than 10 240 entrepreneurs received subsidies in total of 169.1 billion tenge, 772 microcredits have been issued for the amount of 4.3 billion tenge. Starting from January 1, 2017, the microcredit instrument have been implemented within the framework of the Program for the Development of Productive Employment and Mass Entrepreneurship for 2017-2021.

The social and economic effect of the BRM-2020 implementation is an increase in the tax base by the program participants for the amount of 609 billion tenge, the volume of output for the amount of 8.5 trillion tenge, and the preservation and creation of more than 337 thousand permanent jobs.

To date, measures of state support covered more than 160 thousand entrepreneurs. In addition, since the implementation of the BRM-2020 in the context of training tools, short-term business trainings under the project “Business Counselor” and “Business Growth” have been held for 138,568 trainees, 2,109 people have been trained in the "Young Entrepreneur School" project, training of the top management of SMEs was attended by 2 390 heads of enterprises, the "Business Contacts" project training was passed by 3,344 people, of which 450 people were trained abroad at the profile enterprises of the United States and Germany.

In order to create the conditions for the development of entrepreneurial potential, the opening and running of own business in small towns and rural areas, in 2017 a full-scale implementation of the new Program for Productive Employment and Mass Entrepreneurship has begun, which envisages measures aimed at solving problems related to lack of funding and insufficiency collateral.

Under the program, entrepreneurs will be provided with microcredits for a term of up to 7 years, with a maximum amount of up to 8,000 MCIs (over18 million tenge) with a final interest rate of no more than 6%, and a "vacation" for repayment of the principal debt under the loan.

As of September 1 of the current year over 80 projects of borrowers for 1 billion tenge are under consideration by second-tier banks, 12 projects for the amount of 133 million tenge have already received approval for financing.

Within the framework of the program, special attention is paid to teaching the basics of doing business. To date, more than 10,000 beginner rural entrepreneurs have undergone an adapted training course for the basics of doing business under the Bastau Business project, of which more than 17% received financing through the Agrarian Credit Corporation JSC and KazAgro NMH. Training is provided for free with a one-time scholarship payment of 16,000 tenge.

The developed measures within the framework of the program will allow to finance over 2,500 projects in the cities, provide over 500 projects with missing collateral, and improve the prospects of their material well-being for a significant part of the rural population with low incomes.

In addition, since the beginning of this year, Kazakhstan has launched the Program for Productive Employment and Mass Entrepreneurship, which contains effective mechanisms to support business and increase labor mobility of citizens.

In general, we can state that the Government and business are making important steps towards each other, determining the "painful" points and spheres of potential growth. Such close interaction lays a solid foundation for increasing the share of small and medium businesses in the country's GDP.

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