Astana to become donor of republican budget, says mayor

Imangali TasmagambetovAstana will be among four regions-donors of the republican budget, the mayor Imangali Tasmagambetov said at the Friday press conference of the Central Communications Service.

As the city's mayor stressed, at this stage Astana can ensure its vital activity independently. In fact, KZT 7.5 billion will be disposed from its treasury to the republican budget starting from 2015 and KZT 17.3 billion is expected to be disposed in 2016.

"This indicator of paramount importance, since from now on Astana will become one of four regions-donors of the republic budget," Mr. Tasmagambetov explained.

However, budget relationship between the "center" and "regions" for the next three years remained outside the information focus, mintax.kz reports.

These relationships are clearly shown in the document with such a simple title as the RK Law  “Concerning the amounts of general transfers between the Republican and regional budgets, the budgets of the cities of the Republican significance and the capital city."

Given that the currently effective document covers 2011-2013 period which is coming to an end, the current RoK Law "On the Republican Budget for 2014-2016" was supplemented by information concerning the three-year’s budget policy related to withdrawals / subventions between the "Republic" and " regions".

Having read this document, Kapital.kz Business Portal stated the approach of fiscal decentralization in Kazakhstan. In the country’s scale the trend is not total, but noticeable. A striking example of this is the fact that the aggregate size of subventions from the state to local budgets will be reduced from KZT 978 billion in 2014 to KZT 836 billion in 2016. In other words, the support for regions is reduced by nearly $ 1 billion (about KZT 142 billion).

In this regard, it is noteworthy that since 2015 Astana is ranked among the donor regions of the Republican budget. Although in 2014 the capital city will get from the "Republic" about KZT 4.1 billion, whereas in 2015 and 2016 respectively, it will transfer KZT 7.5 billion and KZT 17.2 billion back to the Republic.

Other "leaders" of this process will be Karaganda, Aktobe and Pavlodar regions. The support for the first one will also be reduced by an impressive KZT 34 billion: from KZT 50 billion in 2014 to just over KZT 16 billion in 2016 .

The budget "dependence" of Aktobe region in 2016 will amount to KZT 8.6 billion. By the way, in 2013 it comprised more than KZT 32 billion of the "Republican" funds, and in 2014 and 2015 is going to comprise KZT 29 billion and KZT 20 billion, respectively.

As for Pavlodar region, the Republican subventions transferred to it in 2014 - 2016 will be cut from KZT 21.5 billion to KZT 7.2 billion, respectively. Simply speaking, since 2013 (when the region received KZT 27.7 billion) and ending in 2016, the budget support of the region from the "Centre" will drop in average by KZT 6 bln per year.

Turning to fiscal withdrawals from donor regions, it is necessary to note a positive trend. In particular, while in 2014 the total withdrawals will comprise KZT 132 billion, then by 2016 this figure will grow up to KZT 213 billion.

Talking about the other "players " of this process, one should note an overall trend to a slight decline in the volume of subventions going to regions, except South-Kazakhstan and West Kazakhstan regions. For them, the Budget "support" from the center is going to demonstrate a slight growth over the next three years.