BAKU, Azerbaijan, June 3. On June 2, 2026, the
presidents of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan announced
major steps to strengthen their economies on the same day, showing
that the region is transitioning from separate projects to systemic
development.
In Kazakhstan, President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev held a special
meeting on the project of the city of the future, Alatau.
“Alatau City is indeed a comprehensively developed and
well-balanced project. Global experience shows that it is precisely
the cities of the future that are capable of bringing the
development of countries to a qualitatively new level,” Tokayev
stated.
According to him, the decision to create the city was made
under difficult conditions, but proved to be strategically sound.
The project portfolio has already reached about 2 trillion tenge
(approximately $4 billion). The total volume of investments in
infrastructure will amount to 10.4 trillion tenge ($20.8 billion),
and the long-term effect by 2050 may exceed $40 billion. Currently,
32 investment projects worth 1.5 trillion tenge ($3.05 billion)
have been prepared, of which 20 are being implemented and will
attract 1.2 trillion tenge ($2.4 billion) private investment. At
the start, the project will provide more than 22,000 new jobs.
In Kyrgyzstan, President Sadyr Japarov opened a new head office
of "Eldik Bank" in Bishkek.
“Eldik Bank will take an active part in financing
infrastructure, energy, transport, and social projects of national
scale,” Japarov emphasized.
For the first time in the country's history, the bank entered
international capital markets – in 2026, Eurobonds worth $500
million were placed on the London Stock Exchange. The funds will be
used for the construction of the Upper Naryn hydro power plant
cascade, the development of transport and aviation, as well as
support for education and medicine. This represents a serious
strengthening of the financial system and a new channel for
attracting external resources.
In Uzbekistan, President Shavkat Mirziyoyev reviewed the work
progress of the "Chirchik" chemical-industrial technopark.
“Modernization of industry, production of high-value-added
products, and expansion of export potential are among the priority
directions of economic development,” the press service of the
President of Uzbekistan notes.
The technopark has already established itself as a
next-generation platform. Its area is 26.4 hectares, and
infrastructure investments stand at $25 million. In 2025, $56
million of investments were absorbed here, 758 jobs were created,
and more than 150 types of products worth $60 million were
produced. By 2030, it is planned to increase investments to $207
million, production to $294 million, exports to $48 million, and
the number of jobs to 2,300. In the chemical industry, the current
output of mineral fertilizers is 3.7 million tons per year, and the
planned projects are estimated at $2.8 billion.
The projected GDP growth of the region for 2026 remains high –
averaging 5-6.1%. This creates a solid foundation for further
cooperation and the influx of foreign investments.
Such simultaneous activation noticeably intensifies the effect.
When three countries of the region start significant projects on
the same day, it becomes an example of a coordinated movement
forward, rather than fragmented efforts. Such synchronicity
increases the interest of foreign investors in Central Asia as a
unified economic space and can accelerate the implementation of
joint initiatives.
Today's events confirm that the countries of Central Asia
strive to develop in completely different directions, opening up
real opportunities for diversification. Kazakhstan invests in
advanced urbanism, Kyrgyzstan attracts major world capital, and
Uzbekistan relies on deep raw material processing.
Further development of events may follow two scenarios. Under
the optimistic scenario, the successful launch of the declared
projects will turn the region into a self-sufficient economic hub
capable of attracting up to $50 billion of investment by 2030 due
to the integration of industrial and financial instruments of
neighboring countries. Under the moderate scenario, due to external
market fluctuations, part of the projects will be implemented with
a delay, but the general trend toward import substitution and
moving away from a commodity-dependent mono-structure will be fully
preserved.
