Baku, Azerbaijan, September 18
By Nargiz Sadikhova - Trend:
Kazakhstan’s economy has an impressive record of economic growth which brought down poverty and supported growth of the middle class, the spokesperson for the World Bank told Trend.
According to the spokesperson, the poverty rate dropped from 55 in 2006 to 8 percent in 2018 (measured by the upper middle-income country poverty line of $5.5 a day), as the middle class grew from 10 percent to more than 20 percent during the same period.
“The sharp drop in the global oil price in 2014 weakened growth and negatively affected domestic demand (i.e., consumption and investment). While growth has recovered, productivity growth has remained very weak,” the spokesperson said.
The spokesperson further added, that the issue is productivity growth of Kazakhstan has turned negative and is dragging on overall growth of the economy.
“Without improvement in productivity, Kazakhstan needs an infeasibly high investment ratio to GDP to enter the top-30 global economies by 2050,” the official added.
Currently, as noted by the spokesperson, the economy remains highly dependent on the hydrocarbon sector, with many jobs in low productivity and non-tradeable service activities and new jobs mostly created by public sector and individual enterprises.
“Kazakhstan’s private sector needs to regain its dynamism and become a genuine driver of economic growth,” the spokesperson clarified.
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