Kazakhstan leads in volume of housing construction among CIS countries

Kazakhstan is a leader in the volume of housing construction in the Commonwealth of Independent States. In 2020, 0.81 square meters of housing were built per capita in the country. Experts say that this construction rate is close to the level of developed economies. For example, last year in Russia this index was 0.56 sq m per capita, in Belarus 0.45 and in Uzbekistan 0.36. The ranking has been made since 2019, and Kazakhstan has been a leader among the CIS countries for the second year in a row.

“State support measures enabled us to take the lead in this index, with 15.3 million sq m of housing constructed in 2020, exceeding 2019 by about 17 percent. Of these, nearly 140,000 apartments or individual housing facilities were built. The housing sector attracted about two trillion tenge (US$4.7 billion) of investments,” said Daniyar Aidarkhanov, Press Secretary of the Construction and Housing-Communal Services Affairs Committee.

Despite the positive results of the construction, the Head of State was dissatisfied with the outcome of the implementation of the state program ‘5-10-20’ and also stressed that the prices for apartments should be under special control.

“Slow progress is being made in its implementation as only 9,500 apartments were put into operation, which is 56 percent of the plan. I instruct the government to submit a new package of proposals to improve housing policy within two weeks. The practical implementation of my initiative of using pension savings to improve the housing conditions of Kazakh citizens has begun. Effective measures must now be taken to contain the boom and prices in the real estate market. It is important for the public authorities to carry out explanatory work with the population and developers, and to limit speculative operations in the market,” said President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev.

17 million - that’s how many square meters of housing is planned to be built in Kazakhstan this year. For this purpose, the industry plans to attract more than two trillion tenge (US$4.7 billion). Last year, the construction rate indeed showed record figures, with more than 15 million sq m built. It is almost 17 percent more than in 2019. Time will tell whether we will be able to keep a leading position in the future.