The European Union is Kazakhstan's largest economic partner and, on International Monetary Fund data cited by the European Commission, accounted for 42.1% of the country's goods trade in 2025. Within that relationship Belgium weighs more in recorded investment than in trade. Its goods trade with Kazakhstan came to USD 582.4 m in 2025, about 1.3% of Kazakhstan's trade with the EU, while Belgian companies invested more than USD 15 bn over the past two decades, according to President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev. The state visit of King Philippe and Queen Mathilde in October 2026, the first by a Belgian monarch to Central Asia, brought companies already working in Kazakhstan together with firms in Belgium still weighing entry.

The delegation of 110 people included 26 company heads together with ministers and rectors, according to Belgium's foreign ministry. At the Kazakhstan-Belgium Business Council, business and regional partners signed 17 documents, more than half in agriculture and food. The only published value is more than EUR 40 m, for agreements on agricultural supplies to Belgium.

For owners and boards the practical question is which part of this cooperation rests on contracts in execution, and how far each project takes Belgian business into the Kazakh economy, from selling equipment to processing local raw materials. On the evidence, the contracts in execution predate the visit, and most October documents carry neither a published value nor a timetable. The projects that would go deepest into the Kazakh economy are also the least advanced.

Source: Kazakh official trade data for 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025 and January to August 2026, 2026 estimate by Tretiakov Consulting

Belgium-Kazakhstan Trade in Two Statistical Systems

All trade figures follow one convention so that they can be compared over time. Trade is shown in USD as recorded by Kazakh customs and published by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Embassy in Brussels and the state trade agency QazTrade, in nominal terms without adjustment for inflation. Belgian statistics are cited separately and in the currency of their source, because the two systems record the same flows differently. Where euro amounts are compared with dollar figures, they are converted at the 2025 average reference rate of USD 1.13 per euro. Shares, growth rates, sums and estimates in this article are calculated by Tretiakov Consulting unless a source is given for them.

Turnover rose in three of the four years between 2021 and 2025, with one adjustment in 2024, and reached USD 582.4 m in 2025 according to official data. That level was 11.2% above 2023, more than making up for the previous year's decline. Measured over the four years to 2025, compound annual growth was 8.5%, falling to 4.2% when the starting point is the higher base of 2022, and both rates anchor the scenarios to 2035.

The balance between the two flows shifted in Kazakhstan's favour in 2025. Kazakh exports to Belgium rose by 48% to USD 311.5 m in 2025 and imports from Belgium grew by 10.1% to USD 270.9 m, so exports, which had been the smaller flow in 2024, reached 53.5% of turnover. Kazakhstan therefore moved to a trade surplus with Belgium of about USD 41 m.

Trade has kept growing in 2026, although more slowly than in 2025. In January to August it reached USD 353.1 m, up 9% year on year, against USD 324.0 m in the same months of 2025, which made up 55.6% of that year's total. Applying the same share gives an estimate of about USD 635 m for 2026 by our calculation.

In the first eight months of 2026 the composition of trade followed the pattern of 2025. Kazakh exports rose by 9.7% to USD 183.7 m, led by linseed, molybdenum ores and concentrates, titanium products and wheat, whose shipments to Belgium tripled according to QazTrade. Imports from Belgium grew by 8.3% to USD 169.4 m and consisted mainly of medicines, boilers and other machinery, petroleum products, tractors and farm machinery and vaccines.

Kazakh data reported to the United Nations show how narrow the export side has been over time. Linseed, molybdenum ores and titanium products made up 91% of Kazakh exports to Belgium in 2025. Measured by two-digit product groups, which are wider than the rows of the table below, the three largest accounted for about 84% or more of the total in every year since 2021 except 2023. Linseed alone moved from USD 127.8 m in 2022 to USD 40.9 m in 2023 and USD 164.4 m in 2025. Headline growth in trade thus hinges on one crop.

Source: Kazakh data reported to the United Nations by product and by product group, other products calculated by Tretiakov Consulting

Imports from Belgium are spread across a much wider range of products. From 2023 to 2025 the three largest product groups accounted for between 41% and 48% of Kazakh imports from Belgium, and in 2025 machinery and boilers led with USD 53.9 m. Medicines came to USD 20.2 m in the same year, while harvesting machinery was only USD 1.5 m.

Belgian statistics describe the same exchange with different weights. According to Belgian data for 2025, chemical and pharmaceutical products, chiefly medicines and vaccines, made up 48.4% of Belgian exports to Kazakhstan. In the opposite direction vegetable products, mostly linseed, and mineral products, mostly molybdenum ores and concentrates, accounted for 84% of Belgian imports from Kazakhstan, and base metals for a further 8.8%.

Within the EU, Belgium's position differs sharply between the two directions of trade. In 2025 it was the seventh-largest EU exporter to Kazakhstan, with 5.7% of EU shipments, and only the fourteenth-largest EU buyer of Kazakh goods, with 0.5%. Belgian goods reach Kazakhstan mostly as finished products, while Kazakh goods reach Belgium mostly as raw materials.

Over a longer period Belgian statistics show a relationship that has grown and changed direction. According to Eurostat data reported by Belgium, Belgium's trade with Kazakhstan rose from a low of EUR 224.3 m in 2016 to EUR 762.7 m in 2025, after a peak of EUR 867.6 m in 2022. Belgian imports from Kazakhstan were highest in 2018 and 2019, when mineral fuels made up most of them, and Belgian exports have exceeded imports in every other year since 2015. Those fuel shipments have since fallen to a marginal level.

Source: Eurostat data reported by Belgium, totals calculated by Tretiakov Consulting

The two statistical systems do not show the same picture of this trade. Belgium's foreign ministry puts bilateral trade at about EUR 765 m for 2025, close to the Eurostat figure. Belgian data reported to the United Nations show exports to Kazakhstan of USD 534.6 m, about twice the USD 270.9 m that Kazakh customs record as imports from Belgium. In the other direction Belgian-recorded imports of USD 103.4 m are about a third of the exports to Belgium recorded in Kazakhstan.

Source: Kazakh official data, Belgian data reported to the United Nations and Eurostat data reported by Belgium, totals calculated by Tretiakov Consulting

The gap is widest in pharmaceuticals and in linseed. Belgian data put chemical and pharmaceutical products at about EUR 290 m, or about USD 330 m, of exports to Kazakhstan in 2025, while Kazakh data record imports of the narrower group of medicines and vaccines from Belgium of about USD 26 m. For linseed, Belgium declared 117,200 tonnes of imports from Kazakhstan in 2025, against 277,700 tonnes that Kazakhstan recorded as shipped to Belgium.

Both gaps follow from the way each side records trade. Under EU rules a flow is reported by the member state where the customs declaration is lodged, according to the Eurostat user guide, so medicines of international groups shipped from Belgian distribution centres count as Belgian exports whatever their origin. Kazakhstan, following United Nations recommendations for trade statistics, attributes imports to the country of origin and exports to the country of destination, while Kazakh linseed declared for import in another member state counts there even if it is crushed in Belgium. Belgium's own figures for the United Nations and for Eurostat also differ, which is consistent with the National Bank of Belgium publishing trade under a national concept that leaves out goods handled by non-resident traders while sending the wider EU concept to Eurostat. No official reconciliation for this pair of countries was found.

The two series are therefore shown side by side and are never added together or mixed. The Kazakh series in USD is the main line of this article and the basis of the scenarios, while Belgian data serve as a check on the structure of trade. Any comparison between the two is made in the same currency, and the gap itself is left uncorrected.

Belgian Investment in Kazakhstan and What Lies Behind It

Investment figures here are gross inflows of foreign direct investment (FDI) from Belgium as reported by the National Bank of Kazakhstan, which are neither net flows nor accumulated stock. On that measure Belgian inflows have been about 1.8 to 3 times the annual value of goods trade in every year since 2021. They moderated from USD 1.56 bn in 2022, when Belgium ranked fourth among investor countries, to USD 1.05 bn in 2025.

In 2025 Belgium accounted for about 5% of the USD 20.5 bn of gross inflows into Kazakhstan and ranked fifth among investor countries, according to national news analysis. For the decade from 2015 to 2024 the foreign ministry listed it sixth among the ten main investor countries, after the Netherlands, the United States, Switzerland, Russia and China. Cumulative inflows since 2005 reached about USD 15.0 bn by the end of 2025, our sum of the published total to 2024 and the 2025 inflow, while a foreign ministry note of June 2026 gave more than USD 14.8 bn.

Source: National Bank of Kazakhstan data published by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for 2021 and 2025, published cumulative totals to 2022 and to 2024, 2023 calculation by Tretiakov Consulting

Two features of the statistics limit what these figures can show. FDI is recorded by the country of the immediate investor, so the Belgian line may include capital routed through holding and finance companies registered in Belgium, although no study specific to Belgium was found. Gross inflows also differ from net flows, and net FDI into Kazakhstan as a wholecame to minus USD 0.9 bn in 2025.

The Belgian side of the statistics shows a much smaller footprint. According to National Bank of Belgium data published by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, Belgium's direct investment position in Kazakhstanstood at EUR 320 m at the end of 2024, up from EUR 258 m a year earlier. That stock is a net measure compiled in Belgium, whereas the Kazakh series adds up gross annual inflows, and the two cannot be compared directly. The difference is still wide enough to show that the cumulative USD 15 bn is not a measure of Belgian-owned production capital. No official breakdown of Belgian investment by sector was found.

The operating presence of Belgian business is accordingly more modest than the investment figures imply. The number of companies with Belgian capital is reported as 76 in 2025, more than 110 in June 2026 and more than 100 enterprises and joint ventures in October 2026, a spread that more probably reflects different definitions than a trend. The Belgian companies in Kazakhstan that can be identified by name work mostly through project services, equipment supply and purchases of raw materials, and few of them own production assets in the country.

Recorded capital flows exceed trade by a wide margin, while Kazakh exports to Belgium are concentrated in linseed, molybdenum and titanium and Belgian-recorded exports in medicines. A broader test of the case for capital commitment in Kazakhstan places these flows in the context of the whole economy. For a company deciding on a project, aggregate flows say less than the documents and partners behind each deal. Neither trade nor investment statistics show which of these deals are already backed by contracts.

What the State Visit Signed, From Contract to Memorandum

The royal couple were in Astana from 11 to 13 October 2026 and in Almaty on 14 October, with federal and regional ministers in the party. On 12 October President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev and King Philippe adopted a joint statement of 19 points that names critical minerals, petrochemicals, industry, mechanical engineering, transport and logistics and renewable energy as priorities and stresses the potential of agriculture. The two foreign ministries signed a cooperation roadmap for 2027 to 2029, and the joint statement welcomed the entry into force of a protocol of 7 November 2024 on visa-free travel for holders of service passports. No financial commitment was found in these intergovernmental texts.

The fourth session of the Kazakhstan-Belgium Business Council took place on 13 October with both heads of state present. According to the state broadcaster, the council dates from May 2023, when the Foreign Trade Chamber of Kazakhstan and a Benelux chamber of commerce signed its founding agreement in Almaty. Reports of the council's output differ from one source to another. The broadcaster's Kazakh-language service counted 17 documents, nine of them in the agro-industrial sector, while a report citing the National Chamber of Entrepreneurs Atameken listed 16. A Walloon minister quoted by its Russian-language service spoke of 70 agreements signed that day, a figure not found in other sources.

Agriculture dominates the agreements named in public reports of the council. Three Belgian linseed crushers, Vandeputte, Scaldis-Ruien and Linagro, signed six purchase agreements for Kazakh linseed, and the Akmola regional administration signed with Linagro and Scaldis-Ruien on oilseeds and grain to be shipped through Baltic ports. The published amount of more than EUR 40 m refers to supplies of agricultural raw materials to Belgium and is not attributed to individual agreements.

Two engineering suppliers with similar names signed equipment agreements. A company reported as De Smet concluded a framework agreement on engineering and equipment for a deep wheat processing plant in Kostanay region. Desmet Ballestra, whose oils and fats business, now trading as Desmet, was acquired by the Swedish group Alfa Laval in 2022, agreed to supply equipment for expanding a vegetable oil refinery in Petropavlovsk. None of the reports examined names the Kazakh counterparty of either agreement or the capacity involved.

Further documents reach beyond agricultural trade into machinery, chemicals, construction and healthcare. Dewulf, a maker of potato and vegetable harvesting machinery, signed a memorandum with the Union of Potato and Vegetable Growers of Kazakhstan and the dealer Eurasia Group on potato production, processing technology and investment. The chemicals producer Proviron entered a five-year agreement for Almaty International Airport, under which its Kazakh partner Bagashar will make the high-volume de-icing fluids locally while specialist products and know-how stay in Belgium. The Kazakh company Artex Holding and the Belgian company DOREARCHITECTURE agreed to set up a plant for prefabricated eco-houses, with module exports to Europe planned.

In healthcare, AlatauCity, a planned city of accelerated development, signed framework documents providing for a joint assessment with Ion Beam Applications (IBA) of the technical, medical, financial and legal aspects of the planned Shipa Zholy proton therapy centre. The National Scientific Oncology Centre in Astana and Brussels University Hospital signed a memorandum of cooperation on 12 October, and the two sides discussed wider use of proton therapy, cancer diagnostics and the training of specialists. The Rectors' Forum brought together 29 universities and research institutes, which signed more than 20 agreements and memoranda by most counts, although one national report gives more than ten.

Eight of the academic agreements are named in public reports, including those of Al-Farabi Kazakh National University and Gumilyov Eurasian National University with Ghent University, the University of Leuven in Flanders and the University of Mons. East Kazakhstan Technical University agreed with the University of Leuven to set up a joint centre for critical materials, and Maqsut Narikbayev University signed an agreement with the University of Mons. These agreements create no trade flows, but they build the skills and applied research on which projects in metals and digital technology would draw.

Critical minerals and ports drew attention during the visit, but no signed business documents on either were found. Kazakhstan's President told the Business Council that the country produces 21 of the 34 raw materials considered critical to European industry, and Kazakh officials proposed local processing in partnership with Belgium. A seminar on critical minerals at Nazarbayev University, with Molymet Belgium among the participants, discussed laboratory testing, and the next stage of talks is expected to involve sample exchange, tests of processing methods and feasibility studies. President Tokayev also proposed a partnership between the Port of Antwerp-Bruges and the Caspian ports of Aktau and Kuryk, but Antwerp-Bruges was not represented at the Business Council, and no signing of the framework document proposed in September was found.

The often-quoted figure of USD 12 bn belongs to a different event, the official visit of President Tokayev to Brussels in June 2026. Its largest item was the ceremonial signing of an order for up to 50 passenger aircraft from a European manufacturer, and other items included four transport agreements worth USD 462 m announced by the national railway company, all with non-Belgian partners. The June items with Belgian counterparties were a mirror laboratory of Ghent University at the Alem.ai centre, a memorandum of East Kazakhstan Technical University and Astana Hub with the University of Leuven and its SIM² institute, and the Dewulf localisation agreement. Documents signed in Brussels and documents with Belgian counterparties therefore overlap only in part.

Sorted by the evidence behind them rather than by type, the projects and documents fall into clear groups. Everything already completed or under construction, such as the dredging of Kuryk port and the coating complex at the steelmaker Qarmet, started before the visit, and so did the April and June agreements on localising farm machinery. Among the October documents only the agricultural supply agreements carry a published value and only the Proviron agreement a published term, while most name neither. Linseed crushing, critical metals processing and the port partnership are still at the stage of talks or proposals.

Source: presidential press service, National Chamber of Entrepreneurs, state broadcaster, Proviron, IBA, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, national media, classification by Tretiakov Consulting

The October visit therefore opened channels in agriculture, metals, logistics, health and education, while the commitments with money attached remain small. Most of the capital already at work in these sectors was committed before the visit, through tenders, loans and supply contracts. Whether the new channels turn into projects depends on why each side wants them and on the companies involved.

Why Belgian Companies Are Looking at Kazakhstan Now

The visit came when several Belgian industries were reconsidering where their raw materials come from and how their cargo reaches Kazakhstan. The motives differ by sector and are documented to different degrees. Supply security matters most to processors, EU raw materials policy to metals processors and the transport corridor to contractors and logistics groups.

For the Belgian linseed crushers the main motive is supply. In 2024 Russia provided 53.7% of the EU's imports of linseed from outside the Union and Kazakhstan 24.2% by volume on Eurostat data. In the year to June 2026 Kazakhstan's share of these imports reached about 72%, according to figures of the Grain Union of Kazakhstan. The same report links the shift to higher EU duties on Russian linseed, and it coincided with a record Kazakh harvest of 1.35 m tonnes in 2025. When one company takes more than 90% of its seed from Kazakhstan, as Vandeputte does, purchase agreements protect the supply on which its whole production depends.

For metals processors the motive is set by EU policy. The Critical Raw Materials Act, in force since 23 May 2024, sets non-binding benchmarks for 2030. Under them the EU should cover at least 40% of its annual consumption of strategic raw materials from its own processing and rely on a single third country for no more than 65% of any of them at any relevant stage of processing. In June 2025 the European Commission selected 13 strategic projects outside the EU, among them the Sarytogan graphite deposit in Karaganda region. A second list adopted on 9 October 2026 covers 46 projects, all of them inside the EU.

Campine, the antimony trioxide producer, shows how this policy meets company strategy. When China announced in August 2024 that antimony exports would need licences from 15 September 2024, Campine said it had already cut its sourcing of antimony metal from China to below 5%. In 2025 its chief executive said it buys about 12,000 tonnes a year from Asian mines outside China, and no Campine statement found for this article names Kazakhstan. In our reading, its feasibility talks with East Kazakhstan Technical University and other Kazakh partners fit a wider search for diversified raw materials, although the company has published no such sourcing plan.

The bilateral agreements rest on a framework built between Kazakhstan and the EU before the visit. The Enhanced Partnership and Cooperation Agreement has been fully in force since 1 March 2020, and a 2022 memorandum added a strategic partnership on raw materials. At an EU-Central Asia investors forum in January 2024 the European Commission announced commitments of EUR 10 bn from European and international investors for sustainable transport connectivity in Central Asia. The first EU-Central Asia summit in April 2025 then raised relations to a strategic partnership.

The Middle Corridor, formally the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TITR) linking Kazakhstan with Europe, is the part of this framework that matters most to Jan De Nul, Sarens, Ahlers and the Port of Antwerp-Bruges. Cargo carried on its Kazakh section grew about sixfold from 2020 to 4.5 m tonnes in 2024, eased to 4.1 m tonnes in 2025 and rose by 22% in January to August 2026. A World Bank study of 2023 found that the right investments and policies could triple volumes on the route to about 11 m tonnes by 2030.

Official targets for the route have been moved over time, from a capacity of 10 m tonnes a year by 2027 to the same capacity by 2030, which has the status of an announced goal. These targets and the World Bank estimate are reference points, not commitments of either side. Site choices along this route depend on how quickly the gap between capacity and use closes.

Kazakh policy pushes in the same direction from the other side. The 2023 State of the Nation Address called for raising the share of processed products in the agro-industrial complex to 70% and the share of Kazakh content in regulated procurement to at least 60% within three years. No report of progress towards these targets was found in the 2024 or the 2025 address. Since 1 February 2023 sunflower seed has carried an export duty of 20%, but not less than EUR 100 a tonne, which favours domestic crushing, while no comparable measure for linseed was found. In our reading, for Dewulf and pharmaceutical producers these policies turn localisation from an option into a condition of access to much of the market.

The cost of capital frames all of these projects. The National Bank of Kazakhstan cut its base rate to 16.25% in September 2026 and targets inflation of 5% in 2028. State programmes cap development bank loans for manufacturing at 9% to 11% for up to 20 years, so access to them can matter as much to a project's economics as the technology itself.

The Belgian Business Base, Established Players and Newcomers

No published list of the companies in the delegation was found, so the base is reconstructed from signed documents, meetings reported by ministries and the companies named by President Tokayev. In his address to the Business Council he cited Jan De Nul, Sarens and Ahlers as leading Belgian companies in the country and mentioned the partnership of John Cockerill with Qarmet and cooperation with IBA. The Belgian participants differ in size by almost two orders of magnitude, from global contractors and industrial groups to family-owned linseed crushers.

Companies Established Before the Visit

Ahlers, an Antwerp logistics group, has worked in Kazakhstan since 1998 and in Uzbekistan since 1996. It followed global tobacco producers into the region in the 1990s, won repeat project-cargo work for a long-standing mining client, opened a warehouse in Karaganda in 2023 and has added a 7,000 m² warehouse in Almaty. It signed a memorandum with the national investment promotion agency Kazakh Invest on a logistics terminal in March 2024 and a strategic cooperation agreement with Azurite Group in March 2026. Its own review of the Middle Corridor lists rail capacity, ferry availability and weather on the Caspian and Black Seas among the potential bottlenecks on the route.

Sarens, a heavy lifting specialist, has worked in Kazakhstan since 2003 as a service provider to oil, gas and energy companies. In 2016 it signed with Tengizchevroil what it describes as the largest project in its history, a contract worth EUR 450 m for transporting and installing modules from 2017 to 2020. In January 2026 the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) announced a loan of up to EUR 25 m in tenge equivalent to its wholly owned Kazakh subsidiary for cranes and trailers expected to support at least 11.75 gigawatts of new wind capacity. In November 2025 the company also signed a memorandum on a bypass road and logistics centre at the Khorgos crossing on the border with China.

Jan De Nul has operated through a Kazakh subsidiary registered in August 2016. It completed the dredging of Kuryk portin 2024 as general contractor, removing more than 990,000 m³ of soil to reach depths of 7 to 8 m with equipment of Kazakh contractors working alongside its fleet. In May 2025 the Ministry of Transport said that Aktau port would be deepened by 1.5 to 2 m with the group's equipment. The 2026 programme of dredging and land reclamation at Aktau, however, is carried out by a Chinese general contractor. Against the group's order book of EUR 7.85 bn at the end of 2025, Caspian work is in our reading a small share of its business.

The Belgian-linked industrial project with the longest lead time is a lime plant. Carmeuse, the Belgian lime producer, was announced in January 2016 as partner in a lime plant in Karaganda region, and the plant, built at the Saryopan deposit, opened in December 2023 with capacity of 330,000 tonnes a year and investment of about KZT 30 bn. It is run by Saryopan Operating with Carmeuse as technical partner and was financed by the owner's funds with a state interest-rate subsidy, after support from Kazakh Invest since 2018. Almost eight years passed between the first announcement and the start of production, a useful reference for the timetables of projects signed in 2026.

Other Belgian companies in Kazakhstan work in narrower niches through local subsidiaries or partners. A 2020 survey of Belgian business in Kazakhstan described local operations of suppliers of aluminium building systems, carpet tiles and cookware. Belgian textile machinery and medical products reach the market through Kazakh partners, according to Belgium's trade representation in Almaty. These companies stay outside the visit documents but form part of the base behind the official count of more than 100 enterprises.

The established companies show a recognisable pattern of entry into the market. Sarens and Ahlers came with large clients, oil and gas operators and tobacco producers respectively, and then kept a local subsidiary with equipment, warehouses or a service team that could win the next contract. Jan De Nul's subsidiary, by contrast, predates its first documented Kazakh contract, at Kuryk, by several years. This pattern is our reading of the cases and not the finding of a published study, but it suggests that the newcomers of 2026 will need a first anchor contract before a local entity pays for itself.

Equipment and Technology Suppliers

In metals, the most advanced project predates the visit. John Cockerill, the engineering group based in Seraing, was selected by international tender as the main equipment supplier for a hot-dip galvanising and polymer coating complex at Qarmet in Temirtau. The project is valued at KZT 84 bn, construction began in October 2025 and commissioning is planned for 2027. With the main equipment coming from the group's Beijing subsidiary, the Belgian contribution lies mainly in engineering and technology.

IBA, based in Louvain-la-Neuve, has worked with Kazakhstan for more than ten years, and five of its cyclotrons are in use in the country. One of them, a Cyclone-30 that the Institute of Nuclear Physics in Almaty bought in 2016, was shown to the royal couple on 14 October, according to national reporting of the Almaty programme. During the visit IBA also met the Ministry of Health together with smaller Belgian health technology companies.

Processors Buying Kazakh Raw Materials

Two of the three linseed crushers are known to depend on Kazakhstan for most of their raw material, and no sourcing share was found for the third, Scaldis-Ruien. Vandeputte, a linseed crusher and oleochemicals producer based in Mouscron, sources more than 90% of its linseed from Kazakhstan and processes more than 100,000 tonnes a year, according to national reporting of August 2026, while another report puts its intake at about 120,000 tonnes. Linagro in Lichtervelde took about 70% of its seed from Kazakhstan as early as 2022, and Scaldis-Ruien in Kluisbergen, which says it has specialised in linseed oil since 1904, exports its oil to more than 60 countries.

Molymet Belgium, the Ghent subsidiary of a Chilean molybdenum group, processes molybdenum concentrates of the kind that make up a large share of Belgian imports from Kazakhstan. Its parent signed a memorandum with the Ministry of Industry and Construction and Qazaq Mining Company in June 2025 on deep processing of molybdenum-bearing raw materials, and the company took part in the critical minerals seminar, where no investment was agreed. In our reading, its participation shows that at least one Belgian processor sees Kazakhstan as a source of concentrates even where no new document was signed.

Newcomers and Companies Without Signed Business Documents

No earlier Kazakh contracts of the two equipment suppliers in agri-food processing were found in public sources. De Smet Engineers & Contractors, the best-known Belgian company of that name, has been majority-owned by the French group Parlym since July 2025 and reports more than 350 employees and nearly EUR 70 m of revenue. Reports of the visit name the signatory only as De Smet, so the link to this company is likely but not stated. Desmet, a specialist in plants for the oilseed and grain industry founded in 1946, had turnover of about EUR 300 m in 2021 and expects its integration into Alfa Laval to be completed by July 2027.

In chemicals and construction the visit brought two companies with no previous local operations in Kazakhstan on record, Proviron, a producer of speciality chemicals based in Hemiksem, and DOREARCHITECTURE, the partner of Artex Holding in the eco-house plant. Together with Dewulf, whose localisation agreement of June preceded the visit, they are the only Belgian companies whose documents move production into Kazakhstan. None of the three has published the investment it plans there.

In critical metals, Belgian interest is represented by talks rather than by business documents signed during the visit. Campine, a listed producer of antimony trioxide and recycler of lead based in Beerse, reported record turnover of EUR 766 m in 2025. Hydrometal in Engis belongs to a group that trades and recycles complex materials containing non-ferrous metals and has been owned by the Belgian chemicals group Prayon since 1998. A month before the visit both companies agreed to prepare feasibility studies for joint initiatives with East Kazakhstan Technical University, the national atomic company Kazatomprom and the Ulba Metallurgical Plant, although no source found confirms that Hydrometal was part of the official delegation.

Several smaller firms took part in meetings without signing anything. Representatives of four of them met the Ministry of Health together with IBA. They were Spentys, which makes software for designing orthoses, the 2021 start-up Ugani, which produces 3D-printed prostheses, the medical waste equipment maker Ecosteryl and the online school D-Teach. Ecosteryl reports more than 220 installations in more than 65 countries, which points to wide international experience. For such companies the visit served as an introduction to public buyers.

Source: company reports, Belgian annual accounts and national media

Most of the companies in the table already know Kazakhstan from earlier contracts or supply relationships. For two of the crushers Kazakhstan has become the main source of raw material, and the visit documents touch their core business and sourcing model. For the larger groups Kazakhstan is one market among many, and their Kazakh revenue depends on tenders and on the capital programmes of their clients.

How Deep the Projects Go, From Equipment Supply to Local Processing

A signed document says little about how deep a project would reach into Kazakh industry. To show this, the projects linked to the visit, together with established projects such as the lime plant and the work of Ahlers and Sarens, are placed on a five-step scale. The scale runs from trade only, through project work and service in Kazakhstan and local assembly or production, to the processing of Kazakh raw materials and exports of goods made in Kazakhstan. Each project is marked by its stage, from completed, operating or under construction to a signed document or talks. The classification is ours, rests on the published scope of each project and places each one by the role of the Belgian company, so equipment supplied to a Kazakh processing plant counts as project work and technical partnership in running one counts as processing.

Source: Tretiakov Consulting classification of visit documents and of the company projects described in this article

The chart shows that depth and maturity run in opposite directions. The projects completed, operating or under construction, those of Jan De Nul, Sarens, Ahlers, IBA and John Cockerill at Qarmet, sit at the level of project work and service. The lime plant at Saryopan is the only operating project in which a Belgian company takes part in processing a Kazakh raw material in Kazakhstan. The documents that would move further, into local production, processing of Kazakh crops and metals or exports of goods made in Kazakhstan, are signed frameworks or talks.

The move from trade towards local production has a consequence for how the relationship is measured. Harvesters assembled in Kostanay would replace imported machines, de-icing fluid made in Kazakhstan would replace shipments from Belgium, and equipment that John Cockerill supplies through its Beijing subsidiary never appears as a Belgian export. As cooperation moves deeper, bilateral trade statistics capture less of it and turnover becomes an increasingly weak gauge of how far the two economies are integrated.

Linseed, From Kazakh Seed to Belgian Oil and Feed

The linseed chain shows where the value is added today. All three Belgian crushers make linseed oil in food, feed and technical grades together with linseed cake for ruminant feed, and Vandeputte also produces stand, boiled and blown oilsfor alkyd resins, paints, varnishes, printing inks, putties and foundry use. Linagro sells its oil into linoleum, paints and varnishes, printing inks and alkyd resins, and Scaldis-Ruien also supplies putties and sealants. Kazakh seed therefore ends up in European building materials, coatings and animal feed after processing in Belgium.

Linagro's own figures give the proportions of the process. It sources more than 100,000 tonnes of linseed a year and sells about 35,000 tonnes of oil and 60,000 tonnes of cake, so roughly a third of the seed by weight becomes oil and most of the rest becomes feed. Oil and cake go to two different markets, with different buyers and different logistics.

Published prices were found for the seed but not for the oil. Linseed delivered to Belgium and Germany traded at EUR 530 to 570 a tonne between May and August 2026, while no published price for linseed oil in 2025 or 2026 was found. In 2021, the latest year in a published review of the linseed oil trade, Belgium was the world's largest exporter of linseed oil, shipping more than four times the volume exported by Kazakhstan.

Kazakhstan already has a sizeable crushing industry, mostly built for sunflower and rapeseed. About 90 oilseed plants with combined capacity above 5 m tonnes produced 888,800 tonnes of vegetable oil in 2025, and new plants that will also process linseed are planned in Kokshetau and in the Qyzyljar special economic zone in North Kazakhstan region. Even so, about 67% of the 2024 linseed crop was exported as raw seed, according to the Grain Union of Kazakhstan.

The talks on a joint venture aim to keep more of that crop for crushing in Kazakhstan. In August 2026 Kazakhstan's ambassador and the owner of Vandeputte discussed a joint linseed processing venture in Kazakhstan and the transfer of Belgian expertise in linseed oil and oleochemicals, and another report names large Kazakh producers such as Olzha Agro as possible suppliers. Olzha Agro operated 840,000 hectares in 2021, and its trading arm signed a USD 16 m supply agreement with Vandeputte that year. No signed document on the venture was found as of October 2026.

Belgian crushers compete with Chinese buyers for the same Kazakh seed. Kazakhstan exported a record 1.08 m tonnes of linseed between September 2025 and May 2026, and Belgium was the second destination after China, according to figures of the Grain Union of Kazakhstan. For the full season to August a regional report puts exports at nearly 1.3 m tonnes, of which 347,100 tonnes went to Belgium.

Source: Grain Union of Kazakhstan via the Ministry of Agriculture, shares calculated by Tretiakov Consulting

Moving part of the crushing to Kazakhstan would change who earns the processing margin, but the published evidence shows interest, not yet a business case. A local plant would need long-term seed contracts at competitive prices, buyers for both oil and cake and a logistics route for liquid products. Kazakhstan is not a beneficiary of the EU Generalised Scheme of Preferences, so Kazakh oil would enter the EU at standard most-favoured-nation duty rates, and the duties on seed, oil and cake depend on the specific tariff line.

Wheat and Vegetable Oil, Engineering for Deeper Processing

The two engineering agreements bring technology rather than purchases. De Smet Engineers & Contractors, the likely signatory, builds plants for sugar, ethanol, vegetable oil extraction and refining, and its ethanol offer lists wheat among the starch feedstocks it can process. No technology for separating wheat starch and gluten was found on its website, so the scope of the Kostanay agreement is not clear from public sources. Desmet specialises in plants and equipment for the oilseed and grain industry, which fits the refinery expansion in Petropavlovsk.

Several deep wheat processing projects are planned in Kazakhstan, and many of them rely on Chinese partners. KazFoodProducts plans a 400,000-tonne plant in Kostanay for amino acids, bioethanol, gluten and feed under a memorandum that includes a Chinese engineering group, at a cost of more than KZT 50 bn with commissioning in December 2027. Chinese-backed projects planned in Akmola region include one worth USD 1.5 bn, and a grain processing complex in Kostanay region uses Chinese engineering. No source examined links the De Smet agreement to any of these plants.

In vegetable oil Belgian technology already has a foothold. North Kazakhstan region has seven oilseed plants with capacity of 812,300 tonnes a year, and the largest of them, in Petropavlovsk, uses equipment from Germany, Belgium and Turkey. Belgian equipment is therefore in use in the region's oilseed processing, while in deep wheat processing it competes with Chinese engineering groups linked to planned plants.

Proton Therapy and Radiopharmaceuticals, IBA's Next Step

Ion Beam Applications is the world's largest supplier of proton therapy systems. Its systems equip about 42% of all proton therapy rooms, according to the market-share chart in its mid-2026 results presentation, and in mid-2026 it had 93 sites in operation, installation or production. Its clinical segment, which includes proton therapy, earned EUR 395.3 m of its 2025 sales. Its competitors include suppliers from the United States, Japan and Switzerland, and China registered its first domestically developed rotating-gantry system in June 2026.

Kazakhstan already has a proton therapy centre, supplied by competitors of IBA. The proton therapy unit of the National Scientific Oncology Centre in Astana opened in November 2025 with two treatment rooms and equipment for which the government had engaged companies from Switzerland and the United States. It is designed for up to 1,000 patients a year, while the centre itself spoke in June 2026 of up to 800 patients, including up to 200 paying foreign patients. By the end of July 2026 about 150 patients had completed treatment, which is free for Kazakh citizens.

Kazakhstan registered more than 42,000 new cancer cases in 2025, and in the same year the state funded only nine proton therapy cases abroad. The first centre completed treatment for far fewer patients than its stated capacity in its first nine months. In our reading, the case for the AlatauCity project therefore rests on growth in referrals and on patients from neighbouring countries, and no published demand forecast was found.

The capital decision behind such a project is large. IBA puts the typical price of a compact single-room system with multi-year maintenance at EUR 35 m to 45 m, a figure that refers to projects elsewhere, and has presented compact systems as able to treat 300 to 350 patients a year. AlatauCity was granted its own special legal regime in 2026 with tax incentives of up to 30 years, and the parameters of the Shipa Zholy centre are to be set after the joint assessment.

Radiopharmaceuticals and the service of installed equipment offer IBA nearer-term business. The Institute of Nuclear Physics supplies about 85% of Kazakhstan's radiopharmaceutical products, and in November 2024 IBA agreed to equip Almathera, the country's first private radiopharmacy, with a cyclotron for launch by the first quarter of 2027 under EU Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) standards. During the visit IBA's chief executive discussed the service of the cyclotron at the oncology centre and the expansion of radiopharmaceutical production. For IBA, service and cyclotrons for radiopharmaceutical production are the business in hand, while proton therapy remains an option that depends on demand.

Machinery and Chemicals, From Imports to Local Production

Dewulf has chosen local assembly over exports from its European plants. In June 2026 it agreed to assemble potato harvesting machinery at the Kostanay and Turkestan sites of the machinery assembler AgromashHolding, alongside the Swedish company Väderstad, which makes tillage equipment, with combined investment of EUR 500 m and Dewulf's share not published. The Kostanay arrangement followed agreements signed at a government meeting in April 2026 with AgromashHolding and the dealer Eurasia Group. Dewulf reports more than 550 employees at plants in Belgium, the Netherlands and Romania, and the models and volumes to be assembled in Kazakhstan have not been published.

The choice reflects the structure of the Kazakh machinery market. Locally made machinery holds about 90% of the domestic market, and domestic sales rose from 7,700 to 10,400 units over two years, according to the Prime Minister's office, so local production has become a condition of access to the Kazakh agricultural machinery market. AgromashHolding already assembles machinery for brands from China, Europe and the United States, and Eurasia Group has been a national machinery dealer for more than 20 years. Dewulf thus joins an established assembly and dealer network instead of building its own.

Proviron's agreement is the clearest case of production moving to the client's market. In 2025 the company recorded a peak in Central Asian orders for de-icing products between August and November, and under the new five-year agreement its partner Bagashar will make the high-volume Type I fluid locally. The airport, which a Turkish operator agreed in July 2026 to take into full ownership by buying the remaining 15% for USD 133 m, handled 11.93 m passengers in 2025 and is both party and buyer. The volumes and the investment involved in local production have not been disclosed.

The prefabricated housing plant of Artex Holding and DOREARCHITECTURE is the least documented project of the visit. Neither the revenue of the partners nor the split of roles and capital between them was found in public sources, and the only description found comes from reports on the Business Council. The plan to export modules to Europe nevertheless makes it one of the few visit projects that would sell goods made in Kazakhstan to EU buyers.

Critical Metals, From Research Agreements to Processing

On the Kazakh side the raw material base is substantial. The Ust-Kamenogorsk Titanium and Magnesium Plant sold about 12,000 tonnes of titanium products in 2025 and has an investment programme of KZT 255.5 bn to 2033, including a new titanium sponge plant. KAZ Minerals produced 4,485 tonnes of molybdenum in concentrate in 2025, and Kazakhstan was the fourth-largest producer of titanium sponge in the world in 2025.

On the Belgian side the links remain at the stage of research and studies. The centre agreed by East Kazakhstan Technical University and the University of Leuven belongs to research cooperation, the talks with Campine and Hydrometal concern feasibility studies, and Molymet's memorandum of 2025 has not been followed by an announced investment. Each concerns the move from supplying raw materials to processing them, but as of October 2026 no confirmed investment decision was found for any of them.

What Kazakh Companies Gain and Whether They Can Deliver

In our reading, for Kazakh companies the value of these partnerships lies less in additional sales of raw materials than in processing technology and access to the EU market. Kazakhstan's President made the same point before his June visit, when he described a shift from exchanging raw materials for investment towards joint production. Whether a document becomes a project depends on the Kazakh partner as much as on the Belgian one, yet published financial data were found only for some of them.

Steel

Qarmet, the steel producer in Temirtau, made 3.8 m tonnes of steel in 2025 with revenue of about KZT 1.1 trn. It aims to reach 5 m tonnes of crude steel by 2028 and plans to invest USD 3.5 bn by the end of 2028 in modernising the plant. Its application to finance the coating complex is under review at the Development Bank of Kazakhstan, so the funding of the project built with John Cockerill had not been announced by October 2026. Galvanised and colour-coated steel are products of a higher processing stage, and the complex moves part of the output up the value chain.

According to figures published at the start of construction, the complex will raise capacity for galvanised steel to 844,000 tonnes a year and for colour-coated steel to 254,000 tonnes. The new lines, however, are rated at 240,000 tonnes and up to 180,000 tonnes a year, which does not match the increase implied by these totals. Until the complex is running, the totals are best read as indicative.

Use of the new capacity will decide the return on the complex. That depends on sales of the new products, whose planned volumes and markets have not been disclosed, and on the execution factors common to industrial projects in Kazakhstan. If part of the output is sold into Europe, it will also carry the cost of the EU Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM).

Agriculture and Food

AgromashHolding, the Kostanay-based assembler, reported revenue of KZT 57.5 bn and net profit of KZT 4.6 bn in a national business ranking published in December 2025, and Eurasia Group operates as a machinery dealer with its own service network. For both, the Dewulf localisation adds a harvesting line at a time when the national farm machinery fleet is renewed at 6.5% a year against a government target of 10%, according to the Prime Minister's office. Local assembly of harvesters would also shorten supply lines for spare parts and service, which matters in a crop with a short harvesting window.

Potato growers harvested 2.9 m tonnes in 2025 and expect about 2.8 m tonnes in 2026, with exports going mainly to Uzbekistan. For their union the memorandum with Dewulf opens access to production and processing technology, although it carries no published budget or timetable. Together with the machinery localisation, it covers both the growing and the harvesting of the crop.

For linseed exporters the main result of the visit is a set of purchase agreements with Belgian buyers, and a joint crushing venture would change their position more deeply. It would move part of the value added, in oil, oleochemicals and feed, from Belgium to Kazakhstan, but it would also require Kazakh partners to meet European requirements on oil and feed quality and to commit capital of their own. Large producers such as Olzha Agro have the land and the trading history for such a role, but the Kazakh parties to the six October purchase agreements were not named.

The wheat processing project in Kostanay region and the oil refinery in Petropavlovsk involve Kazakh companies whose names were not disclosed. For these the Belgian contribution is process design and machinery, so the main effect for the Kazakh side is technology for deeper processing of grain and oilseeds. The country harvested 26 m tonnes of grain and 5 m tonnes of oilseeds in 2025, according to the Prime Minister's office. With the capacities of the two plants unpublished, their effect on individual companies cannot yet be measured.

Ports and Logistics

Kazakhstan's Caspian ports have a design capacity of about 22 m tonnes against 8 m tonnes handled in 2025, so logistics counterparts face a gap between capacity and use. Aktau, one of the two ports named in the proposed partnership with Antwerp-Bruges, handled 4.9 m tonnes in 2025 and 63,000 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU) against container capacity of 93,000 TEU. The separate container hub at Aktau is due to reach 240,000 TEU after its second phase in 2027 and 2028.

The EBRD and the EU are financing the modernisation of Aktau port itself. The EBRD provided a loan of up to EUR 35 m, complemented by an EU grant of up to EUR 10 m, to extend two berths and buy new ship-to-shore cranes. The port belongs to the sovereign wealth fund Samruk-Kazyna, whose chief executive said during the visit that talks with the Port of Antwerp-Bruges were under way.

Healthcare and Other Counterparts

In healthcare the counterparts are large public institutions with a clear mandate. The National Scientific Oncology Centre in Astana opened its new building in April 2025 with 210 beds and capacity for up to 10,000 patients a year, and the Institute of Nuclear Physics supplies most of the country's radiopharmaceuticals. AlatauCity, with its special legal regime, is a newer counterpart whose capacity to carry a project of this size will be tested by the joint assessment with IBA.

As a signatory that will also buy the fluid, Almaty International Airport gives the de-icing project an identified source of demand. Artex Holding and the undisclosed partners of De Smet, Desmet and the six linseed agreements cannot be assessed from public data. The evidence of capacity to deliver is therefore strongest where the Kazakh partner is a large established company or institution.

Across these counterparts the partnerships matter most where they bring local production into Kazakhstan, as in steel coating under construction, machinery assembly agreed before the visit and linseed crushing still under discussion. Purchase agreements for unprocessed goods raise volumes without changing the structure of trade between the two countries. The visit documents fall on both sides of this line, with the linseed purchase agreements on the side of volume and the equipment agreements on the side of processing.

What Belgian Companies Will Need to Resolve in Kazakhstan

The agreements signed in Astana commit the parties to study and negotiate, and few of them oblige anyone to build. The tasks that follow are mostly about turning a memorandum into a project with a budget, a site and a buyer. Verifying demand and economics comes first, because most documents rest on statements of interest, not on tested volumes and prices. A structured assessment of market opportunity in Kazakhstan and due diligence on Kazakh partners are the usual starting points, since several counterparts publish limited financial information.

The barriers that Belgian companies face differ by type of project. Equipment suppliers such as John Cockerill, De Smet and Desmet face tenders and EU export rules, and at start-up the risks of commissioning, while the linseed crushers need long-term feedstock contracts and buyers for the processed product. A proton therapy project depends on patient flows and state reimbursement, and critical metals projects depend on feasibility results, permits and the traceability that European buyers require.

The legal and fiscal regime changed substantially in 2025 and 2026, so guidance written before 2026 may not reflect the new rules. A new Tax Code took effect on 1 January 2026, raising value added tax (VAT) to 16% and cutting withholding tax on dividends paid to foreign shareholders to 5% on amounts up to about KZT 954 m. A new investment incentive model replaced priority investment projects with investment agreements that grant tax incentives for up to ten years against counter-obligations of the investor. A separate agreement on investment obligations offers ten years of tax stability.

Investor protection arrangements have also changed over the same period. Since the end of 2025 the functions of the investment ombudsman have sat with the Prosecutor General's Office. Treaty protection rests on a bilateral investment treaty of 1998 between the Belgium-Luxembourg Economic Union and Kazakhstan, and tax relief on a double taxation convention in force since 13 April 2000. By agreement of the parties, disputes can be taken to the court or the arbitration centre of the Astana International Financial Centre, which together completed more than 4,600 cases between 2018 and December 2025.

For a Belgian company these changes turn the choice of entry structure into a negotiation with the state as much as a legal formality. The structure differs between a supplier of equipment, a processor that needs Kazakh raw material and a firm that wants to sell finished goods. The work at this stage, typically handled as market entry and business expansion support, covers the incentive instrument, the treaty position and the governance of the local entity, and the ways to enter Kazakhstan without losing control differ by sector.

For pharmaceutical producers the main issue raised by the visit is localisation. The government has set a target of raising the domestic share of the medicines market from 15.1% in 2024 to 50% by 2029, and President Tokayev invited Belgian pharmaceutical companies to produce locally. Chemical and pharmaceutical products are almost half of Belgian-recorded exports to Kazakhstan, so the target affects the largest line in Belgian statistics, a line that includes shipments from Belgian distribution centres. The main demand instrument is the state's single distributor of medicines, which, according to its 2026 presentation, holds more than 80 long-term contracts with some 30 domestic producers.

Such contracts typically run for ten years, so a Belgian producer that wants access to this demand has to choose a site, a partnership model and a volume of long-term supply. Belgian medicines and medical devices otherwise reach patients through private distributors and through state purchasing via the single distributor. Medicines sold outside the guaranteed free medical care and compulsory health insurance packages carry VAT of 5% in 2026, rising to 10% from 2027, while those supplied under the packages remain exempt. In the commercial channel this turns the choice of distributor or local partner into a question of margin, and the rules on in-country value, offtake and market access decide whether local production earns preferential treatment.

Where the Kazakh buyer selects suppliers by tender, technology is only one criterion among several. Qarmet chose its equipment supplier through an international tender, and Kazakh contractors worked alongside the general contractor's fleet in the dredging of Kuryk. In such procedures the client weighs the whole offer, including price, delivery time and the share of local contractors, so Belgian bidders need a competitive supply chain, including local contractors, as much as a strong technical proposal.

Several projects linked to the visit lead towards shared activity with Kazakh partners. The linseed crushing venture, the prefabricated housing plant, the de-icing fluid project and the local processing of critical minerals proposed by Kazakh officials all involve local production with a Kazakh partner, which may take the form of joint ventures in Kazakhstan. Each of them raises questions of board control and risk oversight, including the protection of the minority partner. A new local entity also needs a management team accountable to the group, a role that interim managers in Kazakhstan can fill during start-up.

Suppliers of machinery and equipment have to comply with European export rules. Since 20 March 2024 EU exporters of listed goods must include a contractual clause limiting onward sales under Article 12g of the EU sanctions regulation in contracts with buyers in most non-EU countries, and Kazakhstan is not among the few exempt partner countries. For Belgian suppliers this brings standard clauses, end-use checks and audit records into the scope of the governance and compliance of foreign-owned businesses in Kazakhstan.

Delivery and commissioning decide the outcome of equipment projects. A Cyclone-18/9 cyclotron made by IBA and delivered to Semey in 2015 never entered service, because IBA declined to give a warranty after the equipment had been stored improperly, and the centre later bought a newer IBA machine. The Qarmet coating complex due in 2027, and any future proton therapy centre, depend as much on commissioning, staffing and maintenance as on the equipment itself. For equipment suppliers the result is measured by the asset in operation, a point that belongs to the operating reality of doing business in Kazakhstan.

For companies that ship goods in either direction, logistics adds a further task. In an interview during the visit, the chief executive of Ahlers said that a single shipment from Europe to Kazakhstan can involve up to 15 companies and authorities, and that delivery times have fallen to between 40 and 60 days. Cost, reliability and the bottlenecks listed in the group's review of the route decide whether the Middle Corridor competes with alternatives for a given cargo.

Financing on the Kazakh side depends on access to state development finance. The Development Bank of Kazakhstan lends to investment projects of KZT 15 bn or more for 5 to 20 years and expects the borrower to contribute at least 20% of the budget. Its subsidiary, the Industrial Development Fund, launched a manufacturing programme at 7% a year for smaller projects in 2022. State support at Saryopan took the form of an interest-rate subsidy, and the Almathera radiopharmacy is financed by a private investment fund. No published financing structure was found for the Dewulf localisation or for any of the October documents.

International lenders fill part of the gap left by expensive local funding. According to Kazakhstan's statement to the EBRD's 2026 annual meeting, the bank signed 18 projects in Kazakhstan in 2025 worth USD 452 m, and the European Investment Bank (EIB) lent EUR 200 m to the Development Bank of Kazakhstan for transport and energy projects. A further EIB loan of EUR 150 m for transport connectivity was signed during President Tokayev's visit to Brussels in June 2026.

Belgian export support for Kazakhstan has improved but remains uneven across Belgium's regions. The Belgian export credit agency Credendo upgraded Kazakhstan's medium and long-term political risk rating by one notch to 4 on its 7-point scale on 19 June 2026. The federal Finexpo instrument can fix the interest rate on export credits for the whole loan periodwherever Credendo insures the risk. Flanders subsidises prospecting trips and offices outside Europe and Wallonia offers loans, guarantees and capital for international projects in any country, while the Brussels agency is closing 12 of its 33 foreign offices and refocusing on Europe. The state export credit agency KazakhExport and Credendo discussed new joint projects and improvements to existing insurance mechanisms at the previous session of the Business Council in June 2025.

What Kazakh Companies Will Need to Work With Belgian and EU Partners

Beyond the named counterparts, the Kazakh companies that work with Belgium can be identified only indirectly, through the structure of trade. Vegetable products, mineral products and base metals together accounted for about 93% of Belgian imports from Kazakhstan in 2025, so most of the value comes from exporters of raw materials and metals. No direct count of Kazakh exporters to Belgium was found, and the requirements that follow rest on this concentration and on the visit documents.

For exporters of raw materials the visit documents add purchase agreements and talks on processing to supply relationships that already existed. The published materials do not disclose quality specifications, logistics arrangements or price formulas, which decide the economics of supply. Exporters that consider producing oil, feed or deep-processed grain products also need a commercial model for a new market, and a go-to-market strategy for Kazakh producers is built around different channels and buyer requirements.

The EU is the largest market for Kazakhstan, and for exporters of metals its climate policy now sets the terms of access. Since the CBAM entered its definitive period on 1 January 2026, European importers of steel, aluminium, fertilisers and other covered goods have been liable for the embedded emissions of their imports. An estimate by the International Trade Centre and QazTrade puts the annual cost for Kazakh steel products above EUR 100 m if default emission values are used. Measured emissions data and accredited verification can lower that cost, which makes emissions accounting part of the operating model of industrial enterprises. For Qarmet's coated steel, verified emissions data would affect the margin on any tonne sold in the EU, whatever its processing stage.

European buyers apply their own technical, environmental and manufacturing standards. The European Union and Kazakhstan memorandum on raw materials, batteries and renewable hydrogen of 7 November 2022 provides for closer alignment of environmental, social and governance standards in raw material supply chains. The Ulba Metallurgical Plant, a party to the talks with Campine and Hydrometal, is on the list of conformant tantalum smelters under the Responsible Minerals Assurance Process, the traceability standard applied by international buyers. In pharmaceuticals, a plant in Shymkent became the first in Central Asia to obtain EU GMP certification in 2025, which shows that the standard is attainable for local producers.

Negotiating with partners whose scale and governance differ from those of most Kazakh mid-market firms is a further requirement. The two largest Belgian groups linked to the visit, Jan De Nul and John Cockerill, report revenue of more than EUR 1 bn, and even smaller partners bring European expectations on reporting, decision rights and protection of technology to any joint venture or licence. Before such a deal the Belgian side typically assesses its Kazakh partner in the same way that foreign buyers approach acquisitions and due diligence in Kazakhstan, and preparing for that review is part of the Kazakh side's work.

Exporters that want a base in the EU also have to decide what role Belgium would play. President Tokayev said that a partnership between Antwerp-Bruges and the ports of Aktau and Kuryk could open wider markets for Kazakh metals, petrochemicals and agricultural products. A Kazakh exporter that follows this route has to choose before entry whether Belgium serves as a distribution point, a processing site or a commercial office. Export insurance belongs to the same decision, and the instruments of KazakhExport give a starting point for it.

Port and logistics operators have more capacity than cargo to fill it. The areas discussed in September alongside a possible framework document with Antwerp-Bruges, including port management, digitalisation and training, all concern the use of existing capacity. Operational efficiency is therefore the main subject of the proposed partnership with Antwerp-Bruges.

Source: Tretiakov Consulting analysis of the visit documents and of the company projects described in this article

Outlook to 2030 and Scenarios to 2035

No official forecast of bilateral trade and no numeric trade target in the visit documents were found, so the outlook rests on the Kazakh trade series and the published agreements. Two scenarios extend the 2026 estimate of about USD 635 m, an inertial one at the compound annual growth rate of 4.2% for 2022 to 2025 and a trend one at 8.5% for 2021 to 2025. Both rates end in 2025, a year lifted by linseed, so the trend path is better read as the upper case.

Source: Kazakh official trade data, estimate and projections by Tretiakov Consulting

Both paths keep trade below USD 1 bn at the end of this decade, and only the trend scenario crosses that level, two years later, in 2032. Cumulative turnover from 2026 to 2035 comes to about USD 7.7 bn in the inertial scenario and USD 9.4 bn in the trend scenario by our calculation. For the second half of the horizon the scenarios simply extend the same rates, and the uncertainty around those years is materially wider than around 2030.

The macroeconomic setting supports moderate growth in trade, not a step change. The International Monetary Fund's World Economic Outlook of October 2026 puts real growth at 4.4% for 2026 and 4.9% for 2027, and the World Bankexpected 4.6% for 2026 in April. The government's draft forecast for 2027 to 2029 assumes growth above 5% a year for budget planning. These are real growth rates, and they are not applied to the nominal dollar series of trade.

The product data show where any increment would have to come from. Linseed is the largest and most volatile line, and a single harvest has moved linseed exports by more than USD 85 m within a year, about three times the gap between the two scenarios in 2027. Molybdenum ores and titanium products depend on demand from Belgian processors and users, while wheat, whose shipments tripled in 2026, starts from only USD 2.9 m in 2025. A bottom-up forecast by product would need volumes and prices that the visit documents do not publish, so these lines show only the direction of change.

Several factors bear on the upper path, each with a different status. Agreements on agricultural supplies to Belgium have been signed, wheat exports to Belgium are rising, and agreements on processing technology for grain and vegetable oil have been concluded. The port partnership is a proposal and a TITR capacity of 10 m tonnes by 2030 is an announced goal.

A simple sensitivity test puts the disclosed sums in proportion to these paths. If the EUR 40 m were an additional annual flow, and not a multi-year volume or purchases already in the base, it would equal about 8% of 2025 turnover at the 2025 average exchange rate. Growing at the trend rate, it would add about USD 0.1 bn to the 2035 level, so any larger effect of the visit on trade depends on processing projects whose parameters have not been published.

Other factors work in the opposite direction and could hold trade back. A linseed crushing venture in Kazakhstan would, if it went ahead, replace part of the seed now shipped to Belgium. Turnover can also swing sharply, and the adjustment of 12.9% in 2024 came mainly from lower imports of Belgian goods. Medicines and vaccines from Belgium could come under pressure if the domestic share of medicines rises towards the national target, unless Belgian producers localise. Local assembly of harvesting machinery will barely register in recorded trade, given the small value of such imports from Belgium.

Investment is likely to remain the larger of the two channels. Assume that gross inflows from Belgium stay between the 2025 level of USD 1.05 bn and the five-year average of USD 1.22 bn. Cumulative inflows since 2005 would then rise from about USD 15.0 bn to between USD 20.3 bn and 21.1 bn by 2030, and to between USD 25.5 bn and 27.2 bn by 2035, by our calculation. This is an extrapolation of the published gross inflow series, and the Belgian-recorded stock of about EUR 0.3 bn, or about USD 0.36 bn, shows how far the two measures differ.

Several milestones will show which path the relationship follows. The Qarmet coating complex and the Almathera radiopharmacy are due to start in 2027, the year in which the two countries mark 35 years of diplomatic relations, and the second phase of the Aktau container hub is planned for 2027 and 2028. Qarmet's target of 5 m tonnes of steel falls in 2028, and the World Bank estimate for the Middle Corridor refers to 2030.

Within Central Asia, Kazakhstan remains the main market for Belgian business. Belgian exports to Kazakhstan in 2025 were nearly five times those to either Uzbekistan or Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan is the only country in the region with a Belgian embassy, although an embassy in Uzbekistan is planned. A separate analysis of which Central Asian market comes first compares the two largest markets of the region in more detail.

From Memorandum to Operating Asset

The October visit added purchase agreements, health memoranda and talks on critical minerals to an established trade and capital relationship. It produced 16 or 17 business documents and more than 20 academic agreements, and only the agricultural supply agreements, worth more than EUR 40 m, carry a published value. The political texts set priorities without financial commitments, so the economic outcome rests on the business documents and on the companies behind them.

Measured by the published evidence, the October documents furthest along are the agricultural supply agreements and the Proviron agreement, which names its Kazakh partners and a five-year term. The documents on the eco-house plant and the proton therapy assessment, as well as the potato memorandum, name their Kazakh parties but have no published budgets or timetables. The equipment agreements for the Kostanay wheat plant and the Petropavlovsk refinery do not yet name the Kazakh counterparty. Agri-food supply and chemicals therefore show the most evidence of becoming projects, while processing of crops and metals, health and logistics depend on decisions not yet taken.

Apart from the lime plant at Saryopan, the projects that would take Belgian business deepest into the Kazakh economy are at the earliest stages, and the cases of the established companies suggest that a local entity pays for itself only after a first anchor contract. Turnover is also a weak guide to this relationship, since localisation and supply through subsidiaries in third countries bypass the bilateral trade line, while recorded investment may include capital routed through holding companies. The scenarios extrapolate past growth and do not price individual projects.

For Belgian companies the dividing line runs between a memorandum signed in Astana and a contract that holds up under the new tax regime and EU compliance rules. For Kazakh companies it runs between selling more raw material to Belgium and selling processed goods that meet European standards. In both cases the test is whether a document acquires a published budget, site and timetable.

Tretiakov Consulting supports Belgian companies entering Kazakhstan and Kazakh companies building partnerships in Belgium, from partner assessment to project delivery. Discuss your mandate.