Atameken and Ministry of Agriculture discussed pressing issues of farmers
The National Chamber of Entrepreneurs gathered on its platform all the relevant departments related to agricultural issues.
The experts developed the schedule of meetings of the Ministry of Agriculture with industry associations to solve and address the farmers’ issues. When occurring the issues beyond the authority of the Ministry of Agriculture, the Chamber of Entrepreneurs intends to bring them for discussion at the government level.
The meeting on discussion of the agricultural issues was held by Ablay Myrzakhmetov, Chairman of the Board of the Atameken NCE RK, together with Saparkhan Omarov, Minister of Agriculture of RK. The meeting was also attended by members of the committees of the agro-industrial complex and food industry, relevant government agencies and business representatives.
The participants of the meeting identified the key systemic problems of the industry. Representatives of the agricultural business noted the constant lack of subsidies and systemic underfunding of the industry, the problems of farmers' access to loans and deficiencies in the Qoldau information system, representatives of relevant associations expressed specific problems for their industries this year that become a difficult one. For example, Ivan Sauer, Chairman of the AIC Committee of the Atameken NCE RK, raised the issue of the need to take cardinal measures on import substitution.
According to Ivan Sauer, the measures of state support should be focused on those types of products on which Kazakhstan remains import-dependent. For example, Kazakhstan imports $151m worth of dairy products annually. Imported products can be replaced by domestic products, provided that they are systematically supported by dairy farmers.
Ablay Myrzakhmetov expressed the view that more stringent measures should be taken to protect domestic producers, following the example of neighboring countries:
"We have been saying for a long time that we need to introduce a policy of reasonable protectionism. All the governments of neighboring countries are protecting their producers. The time has come for us to act actively and take mirror measures in the interests of domestic producers”.
Saparkhan Omarov suggested holding working meetings with each association to elaborate on the issues of each sub-sector.
"We have now set a schedule of meeting with each association. The first ones are representatives of flour mills, then grain mills, and so on," Saparkhan Omarov said determining further actions of the Ministry to address the issues of farmers.
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