A number of social facilities were visited in the course of the working visit: the new Otyrar micro district, which is being built as part of the Nurly Zher State Housing Construction Program, and the Yassawi International Kazakh-Turkish University.

Sagintayev and Dzhaksybekov reported on the implementation of the Master Plan for the development of the city of Turkestan and presented a vision of a new administrative and business center, in particular, plans for further modernization of social, road, construction infrastructure, and housing and communal services.

Akim of the Turkestan Region Zhanseit Tuimebayev also spoke about the project of the revival of the historical part of “Kone Turkistan.” The project is aimed at the reconstruction of fortifications around the Mausoleum of Kh. A. Yassawi and will be realized until 2026.

To date the territory of Turkestan is 7,4 thousand km². Within the administrative division, the city includes 12 village and aul districts and 35 settlements. The population as of May 1 is 263 thousand people.

For January-May of this year, the volume of industrial production amounted to 6,329.6 million tenge, or 108.5% to indicators for the same period in 2017. The volume of agricultural production grew by 5.9% to 8392.4 million tenge.

As of June 1, the number of active SMEs was 13.3 thousand, which is 1.5% higher than in the same period last year. The volume of construction work amounted to 2896.3 million tenge (100.9%). Nearly 33,368 m² of housing was commissioned, or 101.9% of the level of the corresponding period last year.

It should be recalled, June 19 by the Decree of the Head of State "On Some Issues of the Administrative and Territorial Structure of the Republic of Kazakhstan," the South Kazakhstan region was renamed as Turkestan region with the administrative center in the city of Turkestan.

"The regional center is the city of Turkestan, which for centuries has been the heart of the political and spiritual life of the Kazakh Khanate and the entire Turkic world," President N. Nazarbayev said at the ceremony of public signing of the Decree.