The draft law “On introducing amendments and additions to some legislative acts of the Republic of Kazakhstan on the development of the business environment and regulation of trading activities” was presented during the meeting of Trade Committee of the Presidium of the NCE RK “Atameken”.

The developer was the Ministry of National Economy of the Republic of Kazakhstan. The seventh package of amendments for conducting reforms within the DoingBusiness rating is aimed at creating favorable conditions for doing business and improving trading activities. The document provides for 300 amendments to 38 regulatory legal acts (10 codes and 28 laws), and consists of 2 sets of questions.

The first block includes 5 indicators for the implementation of the “DoingBusiness” rating: “Connection to the power supply system”, “Opening of enterprises”, “Protection of minority investors”, “Obtaining building permits” and “Taxation”.

The second block is aimed at improving the regulation of electronic and exchange trade, domestic trade in the agro-industrial complex, as well as the harmonization of national legislation in the regulation of foreign trade.

“Within the framework of the draft law for the development of electronic commerce, we propose to simplify customs declaration, using postal documents as a declaration. Also the bill will contain the concept of e-commerce. There is a clear distinction between the subjects of electronic commerce and their functionality as online stores, electronic trading platforms, information and advertising electronic platforms, and regulation of the mobile payment system is also expected,” - Aizhan Bizhanova, director of the trade department of the MNE RK, said.

The new draft law defines the complete portfolio, which provides a full range of logistics services in electronic commerce.

The National Chamber took an active part in amending the draft law, most of which were supported by the Committee members. In particular, the bill provides for a package of amendments aimed at improving commodity exchanges. It is proposed to:

- delimit the subject of activity of commodity exchanges and electronic trading platforms according to the principle of preserving the turnover of standardized types of goods on exchanges,

- exclude the mode of the classic auction, which, in fact, records over-the-counter transactions for non-standardized goods, concluded between sellers and buyers, known to each other.

According to the representative of the Ministry of National Economy of the Republic of Kazakhstan, these innovations are related to international best practice, where the main function of the exchange is to form a fair price due to pure competition, as well as free access of business entities to the exchange platform.

“In order to stimulate the development of exchange trade and reduce the administrative burden on business, it was proposed in the new draft law to recognize the prices of exchange transactions as market transactions. In addition, within the framework of licensing institutions, brokers and dealers are proposed to be replaced with tools of voluntary self-regulation and accreditation on stock exchanges,” - Aizhan Bizhanova said.

According to the speaker, this will strengthen the responsibility of all participants of exchange trading. The bill aims to solve the problem of rising prices for socially important goods. For this, there is a ban on the establishment of retro-bonuses for the sale of socially important goods, as well as rules on the introduction of greater flexibility for the activities of stabilization funds. The powers of SEC to independently determine the time and quantity of goods purchased and their subsequent implementation will be expanded.

The director of the department of trade of the NCE RK "Atameken" Dinmukhamed Absattarov emphasized that today akimats provide only stationary points, which does not allow to fully develop the outbound trade. The new bill proposes to give local executive bodies the right to approve routes for trading.

During the meeting, the problematic issues were raised by entrepreneurs marking the products with the signs “Organic”, “Eco”, “Bio”. Representatives of the Ministry of Agriculture and the Department for the Regulation of Trading Activities of the MNE RK took an active part in the discussion. It is worth noting that the issue cannot be considered for a long time without the position of the Committee on Public Health Protection of the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Kazakhstan and the Committee on Regulation of Natural Monopolies and Protection of Competition of the Ministry of National Economy of Kazakhstan, which did not attend the meeting.

“The Committee of Trade has done a great and fruitful work, approximately 90% of all initiatives from members of the Committee and the Department of Commerce are reflected in the seventh package. The so-called “non-working” norms are excluded or refined. The National Chamber observes an evolutionary approach in the process of working on the draft law jointly with the MNE RK and other state bodies, which is manifested in the phased reform of the legislation. This is very important and useful for business entities, since all changes are as painless as possible and is aimed at improving and developing the business environment,” - Dinmukhamed Absattarov resumed the meeting.

Following the discussion, it was decided to approve the seventh package of amendments. On the issue of labeling, members of the committee are recommended to study the current legislation of the Republic of Kazakhstan, as well as regulatory documents of the EAEU and the WTO.