Kazakhstan, Astana, Jan. 16 / Trend D. Mukhtarov /
Around 100 countries will take part in the EXPO-2017 in Astana. This was announced by the secretary general of the International Exhibitions Bureau Vicente Loscertales at a press conference today.
"Various criteria have to be taken into account while calculating the number of countries that will participate at the Expo. This is extremely important for many countries in the world. It is difficult to specify the number of participating countries at the moment, but I can voice a rough figure of more than one hundred. I believe this is a reasonable figure," Vicente Loscertales
He said breaking the record for the number of participants should not be the goal in preparing for EXPO. It is necessary to strive for a decent quality of pavilions and presentations prepared by each of the countries, Loscertales said.
"The more countries that participate in EXPO-2017, the more international relations will benefit and the more will the network of Kazakhstan's future partners expand. Energy of the future is another important subject," he said.
Secretary General of the International Exhibitions Bureau stated that Kazakhstan worked hard to build the necessary infrastructure for a successful exhibition.
"The taken steps were the measures to create a state corporation which will be responsible for the implementation of EXPO-2017 and establishment of relevant institutional committees. All these measures create a direction and political control in this work. All action taken complies with the requirements and rules of our organisation, "Vicente Loscertales said.
He went on to say that all aspects have to be developed for the implementation of EXPO-2017, namely construction, communication policy, number of participants, infrastructure and a number of other issues.
"All these issues have already been developed when Kazakhstan was nominated to hold the exhibition. However, they need to be worked through more closely to the end to enable our organisation to obtain the results by the end of year," Loscertales said.
Loscertales noted that the first meetings with the representatives of the countries accepting invitations to take part at the exhibition will be held by late 2014, adding that meetings discussing and explaining details on holding EXPO-2017 will take place in the short run. This phase of the project will run from 2015 to 2017.
"It is necessary to prepare two periodic reports for the International Exhibitions Bureau. The first will be developed early this year and the second in the second half of the year. In addition, two additional reports have to be prepared for the General Assembly. One report will be submitted in June, the second in November 2012. This is a schedule of upcoming events for this year, "Loscertales said.