A New Economic Program in Kazakhstan

During the last week of December, the Kazakhstan Stock Exchange opened up a second round of trading for shares in energy company KazTransOil to Kazakh citizens. The program is part of a government initiative meant to tie the Kazakh people into the major government enterprises as a social stability mechanism and raise much-needed funds for the large state firms. The idea for the initiative began in 2011, with the publicly stated goals of raising funds for the participating companies' investment plans, involving the Kazakh people in the state's economy, diversifying savings for the population and increasing the transparency of the largest national companies.

However, other former Soviet states have had little success with similar programs, and the way the Kazakh government is designing the program would leave much of the Kazakh population and many critical social programs vulnerable to economic fluctuations. Despite the risks, the Kazakh government is moving forward with the program for now because they see a serious need to tie the Kazakh population into the state system and raise cash as well. The government believes they have set up enough safeguards to mitigate the risks, though the long-term viability of the programs remains to be seen.