Necessary to raise competitiveness of Kazakh companies in terms of Eurasian Economic Union and WTO - Dossayev

The Minister noted the significant deterioration of Kazakhstan's position in the international rankings compared to last year due to poor development in the field of technology and innovation. In particular, in WEF's Global Competitiveness Report Kazakhstan moved down on such indicators as procurement of high-tech products, ability of companies to use modern technology, foreign direct investment and technology transfer, collaboration between universities and businesses in the research and development.

The limiting factor in the development of institutions is still a high level of corruption, Dossayev noted.

"Kazakhstan moved 15 places down to 80th place on the informal payments and bribes indicator. According to WEF surveys, the areas prone to corruption most of all are housing and utilities sector, judiciary system, customs procedures," he said.

According to him, low positions among the macroeconomic indicators are on "Share of imports in GDP" and "Average annual rate of inflation" in connection with a reduction in the share of imports in GDP from 22.8% to 21.8% and an increase in the average annual inflation rate from 5.1 % to 5.8% at the end of 2013.

He noted that in order to improve the position of Kazakhstan in the international rankings in February of this year the Government approved master plans to improve the competitiveness of Kazakhstan on five factors: "Macroeconomics", "Institutions", "Business", "Technology and Innovation", "Human Development".