Kazakhstan successfully completed accession negotiations to the WTO

Kazakhstan, after 19 years, completed negotiations on the conditions for joining the World Trade Organization (WTO). Members of the working group welcomed at the June 10 meeting the completion of the negotiation process, which had become “one of the biggest challenges” in the 20-year history of the WTO.

The draft for Kazakhstan's accession to the WTO will be officially approved on June 22, and then sent to the General Council for formal adoption by each of the 161st WTO members. “I congratulate the WTO members and the government of the Republic of Kazakhstan on this historic milestone - today the negotiations on Kazakhstan’s accession to the WTO have been completed. I look forward to Kazakhstan joining the WTO,” said the organization’s director general, Roberto Azevedo.

As noted in the release, the complexity and uniqueness of Kazakhstan’s accession to the WTO was the need to agree on tariffs, which is associated with the republic’s membership in the Eurasian Economic Union. Kazakhstan applied for WTO membership on 29 in January of 1996.

The day before, the Ministry of Agriculture of Kazakhstan reported that Kazakhstan’s accession to the WTO could not be indicated by specific deadlines until conditions favorable to the republic were agreed.