CIC Special Briefing - Kazakhstan's Place in the World

The word 'Kazakh' comes from the Turkic and means free and independent. However, the people of Kazakhstan did not finally realise either their freedom, or their independence, until 1991. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, seventy years of Communist and 150 years of Tsarist rule were brought to an end, and Kazakhstan became the largest independent state, after Russia, to emerge from the former Soviet republics. To an extent that is not yet fully recognised, both East and West have a strong vested interest in Kazakhstan's continuing freedom and independence as well its stability.

Politically as well as economically, the country is the most liberal of the five Central Asian states and the region's pacesetter. Since gaining its independence it has also established an impressive record of constructive international engagement which has included negotiations to scrap its nuclear weapons programme, an important and energetic role in combating terrorism, participation in regional and international programmes to promote regional and international and stability, as well a recent commitment to assist post-war construction in Iraq. Were Kazakhstan to falter or to reverse its present programme of reform, this would have a political and economic significance that would extend far beyond its own borders and those of the region.

Kazakhstan possesses enormous fossil fuel reserves. The development of its oil fields through the creation of international consortia over the last decade, combined with the opening of the 948?mile long Caspian Consortium Pipeline in 2001, has greatly boosted its oil exports. These are likely to grow even more rapidly in the coming decades as additional pipelines are constructed and new oil fields exploited. The country's growing economic and strategic importance is underlined both by the fact that world's oil needs are projected to double by the middle of this century and by the growing realisation that many producer countries are situated in regions that are politically unstable.

Some industry analysts anticipate that potentially the biggest customer for Kazakhstan's growing exports of oil and gas may be China, and that the latter's rapid economic growth will depend crucially upon adequate and secure energy supplies from Central Asia, even if for economic and political reasons Kazakhstan is unlikely to place itself in the position of sole supplier. Any disruption in supply could jeopardise China's expansion, leading to serious implications for that country's programme of economic and political reform. The flow of Kazakh oil, which accounts for 88 per cent of oil reserves in the region, is also having the effect of reducing the dominance of Opec and the West's dependence on supplies from the Middle East. In addition, Kazakhstan possesses huge reserves of a large a number of other minerals. These include around a quarter of the world's uranium resources, much of it of high quality; it has ambitious plans to become the world's number one producer of uranium by the year 2007.