(Photo: Francesco Ammendola – Office for Press and Communication of the Presidency of the Republic / quirinale.it)
by Silvia Boltuc * –
The president of Kazakhstan, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, is on an official visit to Rome to open a “new chapter” of relations with its third trading partner, Italy. The first meetings of the busy Italian agenda were with President Sergio Mattarella at the Quirinale and with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni at Palazzo Chigi.
If Kazakhstan has attracted Italy’s attention by virtue of its energy diversification strategy, energy is not the only potential field of cooperation. In the Declaration on Growth signed last September in Astana by foreign ministers Antonio Tajani and Murat Nurtleu, in fact, various sectors can be seen that present the Central Asian country as a highly strategic partner, from energy and digital transition, to rare earths, transport infrastructure , industry and last but not least a sector dear to Italy, the agricultural one. These will be accompanied by closer collaborations between mutual universities and mutual investment funds such as the one for the manufacturing, energy and logistics industries to which the Kazakh sovereign fund Samruk-Kazyna and the Italian group Cassa Depositi e Prestiti (Cdp) will contribute.
Accompanying Tokayev on his visit to the Italian capital is a very high profile delegation: the ministers of Energy, Almasadam Satkaliyev, of Industry and Construction, Kanat Sharlapaev, of Science and Education Nurbek Sayasat, of Agriculture Aidarbek Saparov, Deputy Foreign Minister Roman Vassilenko and Deputy Transport Minister Talgat Lastaev. Alongside the government were representatives of the business world and large Kazakh conglomerates such as KazMunaiGas, Samruk Kazyna, Atameken, KazTransGaz Aimak, Association of the Kazakh Machinery Industry, Development Bank of Kazakhstan, Green Hydrogen Union of Kazakhstan, etc. The meetings could not miss Italian excellence, such as Eni, Leonardo and Fincantieri.
The joint working tables, particularly the one organized at the Farnesina which saw the presence of Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani, marked a significant advancement of the bilateral agreements. Specifically, the first day of negotiations saw the signing of seven intergovernmental agreements and 16 commercial memorandums of understanding. To assist the joint activities of companies from the two countries and improve the panorama of joint investments, the Business Council was founded.
Among the projects that will see the two states as protagonists, there will also be the construction, by the Italian Eni and the Kazakh KazMunaiGas, of a hybrid power plant in Kazakhstan with a total capacity of 247 megawatts.
During the meetings, Foreign Minister Tajani touched on two of the great themes of current global geopolitical affairs: conflicts and transport routes. The Italian diplomat underlined the mediating role assumed by Kazakhstan in recent years, from the religious world to the disputes between the Eurasian superpowers. In addition, Tajani recalled the Middle Corridor and the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TITR), the transport route that horizontally connects the routes from China to Europe, bypassing Russian territory. Kazakhstan accounts for 80% of the freight traffic between China and the West, as recalled by the Kazakh President himself, and the construction of the corridor’s infrastructure offers great opportunities to Italian companies. Tokayev recalled how the volume of goods in transit through Kazakhstan has doubled and how in the last 15 years the country has invested more than 35 billion dollars in the transport sector, becoming an important logistics hub.
The visit of the Kazakh delegation also included the Roman headquarters of the FAO, the United Nations and the World Food Program, as well as an audience in the Vatican with Pope Francis.
In conclusion, a growing trend in bilateral relations between Italy and Kazakhstan is expected in the near future, a cooperation on multiple fronts that will embrace the most important excellences of the two countries. The historic government visit to the Central Asian country marks Rome’s renewed interest in exploring new commercial scenarios and confirms Kazakhstan’s openness towards foreign markets, in line with the multi-vector strategy that the country has adopted in terms of partnerships.
* Director of SpecialEurasia.