OREANDA-NEWS. November 28, 2007. As of today, protocols on Kazakhstan’s accession into the WTO have been signed with 18 out of 25 countries with which Kazakhstan holds bilateral negotiations. This was announced today by Ms. Zhanar Aitzhanova, Kazakh Vice Minister of Industry and Trade, reported the Official website http://en.government.kz.

“We have signed protocols with 18 countries; they are to be followed by Malaysia shortly. Active talks are in progress with Australia, EU countries, the USA, Canada and India”, Ms. Aitzhanova said.

Most vectors of the talks are package issues, including currency exchange, tax policy, etc. Talks are under way on agriculture issues with four major producing countries – Brazil, Australia, the USA and Canada. One of the most uneasy issues is that of subsidies to agriculture. Access to the markets of goods and services is also on the agenda.

Kazakhstan has nearly brought its national legislation in conformity with the WTO norms in terms of intellectual property rights. Efforts have also been taken to bring the national laws in line with international norms in realms of technical regulation, security provision, veterinary service and phyto-sanitary control. Amendments have been added into the Tax and Customs Codes, the Vce Minister added.

The subsoil use legislation is to be further brought in line with the TRIMS Agreement; tariffs for railway freights should be unified as well as the rates of the excise tax on domestically-produced and imported goods. Another task is to stagedly reduce the customs duties for exported goods, further cut down the list of licensed activities, and introduce respective WTO norms for imports of genetically modified products.