PrintKazakhstan has the Caspian Sea region's largest recoverable crude oil reserves, and its production accounts for almost two-thirds of the roughly 2 million barrels per day (bbl/d) currently being produced in the region (including regional oil producers Azerbaijan, and Turkmenistan). Kazakhstan oil exports are the foundation of the country’s economy and have ensured that average real GDP growth has stayed above 9 percent for the last 6 years.
Kazakhstan's growing petroleum industry accounts for roughly 30 percent of the country’s GDP and over half of its export revenues. As a result, the Kazakhstani government and financial institutions like the IMF have been concerned about Dutch Disease, the economic phenomenon that occurs when large influxes of foreign currency distort exchange rates and ultimately hinder growth in the non-energy sector.
In its latest report, however, the IMF cites "impressive" growth in the non-oil sector that could help avoid oil-related growth problems. In an effort to reduce Kazakhstan's exposure to price fluctuations for energy and commodities exports, the government created the National Oil Fund of Kazakhstan . Due to high oil prices the international reserves and assets in the oil fund have doubled in the last year to $24 billion in August 2006.
In the next several years, the National Bank of Kazakhstan (NBK) will have to support tighter monetary and fiscal policies since the Bank has missed its inflationary targets for the past three years. Still, the NBK has mitigated rising price pressures by increasing interest rates in March and July 2006 after two similar moves were made during 2005.
Kazakhstan's President, Nursultan Nazarbaev, has been involved in the country's politics since 1977 when he served as Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Kazakhstan. In April 1990, Nazarbaev became interim president of the newly independent Republic of Kazakhstan, and was later elected to the post in the country's first national elections, held in December 1991. Nazarbaev was re-elected December 2005 and his term expires in 2013, unless he chooses to appoint a successor beforehand.
The Kazakh executive branch was re-shuffled in June 2003 when then-Prime Minister Imanghaliy Tasmaghambetov resigned from his position. A new Prime Minister, Daniyal Akmetov, was appointed along with a new cabinet, including numerous holdovers from the previous administration. Parliamentary elections were held in 2004, during which the party led by Dariga Nazarbaev, the president's daughter, won 11 percent of the vote. Opposition parties have alleged that authorities committed election fraud, and one month after the elections were over, the speaker of the parliament resigned because he accused the election of being "manipulated."
Kazakhstan sits near the northeast portion of the Caspian Sea and claims most of the Sea's biggest known oil fields. Kazakhstan's combined onshore and offshore proven hydrocarbon reserves have been estimated between 9 and 40 billion barrels (comparable to OPEC members Algeria on the low end and Libya on the high end). Please see the reports by the US Geological Survey (USGS) for an extensive account of the country’s North Caspian and North Ustyurt basins’ oil reserves.
The country is no longer a minor world oil exporter as it was during the late 1990s, and it is poised to become an even more significant player in world oil markets over the next decade. According to Kazmunaigaz, Kazakhstan’s state oil and gas company, total investment levels in offshore areas of the Caspian Sea are expected to rise from $3.8 billion for 2003-2005 to $16.8 billion for 2011-2015.
Kazakhstan produced approximately 1.29 million barrels per day (bbl/d) of oil in 2005 and consumed just 222,000 bbl/d, resulting in net exports of over 1 mill
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