During the official opening ceremony of the Congress, Prime Minister Bakytzhan Sagintayev read out the address of the Head of State Nursultan Nazarbayev to the delegates.

Chairman of the Board A. Myrzakhmetov delivered a report on the results of the activities of the NCE and the actualization of the Development Strategy of the Chamber.

"Since October 2013, more than 23 thousand appeals have been received, 40% of them have been protected, thus more than 111 billion tenge of preserved property monetary and other rights of entrepreneurs were satisfied," he said.

In addition, reporting on strategic priorities for 2016-2018, Chairman of the Board of Atameken NCE A. Myrzakhmetov stressed that the protection of rights and legitimate interests of business entities is one of the priority directions for the development of the strategic plan. Priorities also include improving the business environment, ensuring the availability of finance, infrastructure and markets, the development of human capital and business support services

Chairman of the Business Women Council of Mangistau Region Saule Salikhova and Chairman of the Board of Eurasian Resources Group Alexander Mashkevich also spoke in the course of the discussion of the NCE Board’s report.

Following the vote, the report of the Board of the NCE was adopted unanimously.

To date, Atameken is represented in all regions of Kazakhstan — in all regional cen-ters, districts and major cities. NPPs accredited 141 associations.

To ensure the creation and operation of the NCE, a constituent period of one year and a transition period of up to five years from the date of enactment of this Law has been established. Thus, July 22, 2018, the transitional period is over, which implies the withdrawal of the Government from the membership in the Atameken NCE. Under the new Agreement, issues will be resolved on the principles of further interaction be-tween the Government and Atameken and the planning of joint activities.

Bakytzhan Sagintayev noted the importance of the Congress in his speech, taking into account the completion of the first five years of work. September 9, 2013, the Government assumed responsibility and jointly with the then Atameken Union created the National Chamber.

"This is a very important congress, because we are considering the results of the five-year work. ... Very soon we are going to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of Astana. Who will believe what our capital was like 20 years ago? The same can be said about our Chamber. What it was five years ago and what it is now. Five years ago we were at the beginning of this process, we were witnesses ourselves, we saw why this was done, for what," the Prime Minister said.

Sagintayev pointed out that the Government carried out a lot of work to improve the legislative regulation of business.

As is known, for five years the Government together with the NCE has developed six packages of amendments aimed at the improvement of business and reduction of administrative barriers. As a result, according to the World Bank’s Doing Business-2018 ranking, Kazakhstan took 36th place and for five years rose in this rating by 40 points. In 2015 the Entrepreneurial Code, prepared jointly with Atameken, was adopted. It was the first time that brought together all legal norms regulating business and became a kind of "Constitution of Entrepreneurs." Literally six months ago, with the direct participation of the Chamber, the basic Codes for business — Tax and Customs, as well as the Code "On Subsoil and Subsoil Use" were adopted. Only in 2017 there were about 1000 amendments to 14 codes and 109 laws.

The Prime Minister also noted the active work of the Atameken NCE on digitalization. The Government is interested in the inflow of domestic investments into such areas as technological renewal of industrial enterprises and the introduction of elements of Industry 4.0; transport and logistics infrastructure; modern technology in housing and communal services and construction; the use of "smart technologies" to increase labor productivity and exports of processed agricultural products; the creation of "smart cities" to improve the quality of life; the development of human capital as the basis of modernization.

The issue of the competitiveness of domestic business and the expansion of export production was also touched upon.

"Our products must be competitive, in demand. We should not forget that our domestic market will require better products of local producers," the Prime Minister stressed.

In addition, special attention was paid to the measures taken to develop small and medium businesses.

"Bastau-Business program initiated by the NCE prompted people to be directed to microbusiness. The need is really big. We must develop mass entrepreneurship in the country," Sagintayev said.

As is known, today the key support tools for SMEs are the Single Program for Business Support and Development Business Road Map 2020, the Program for the Development of Productive Employment and Mass Entrepreneurship.

Measures of state support cover all regions. Only one Business Road Map - 2020 program for the entire period of its implementation, as of June 1, 2018, supported more than 350 thousand SMEs. As a result, the program participants paid taxes to the treasury in the amount of 847.7 billion tenge. Manufactured products at 3.5 trillion tenge. They created 348.6 thousand jobs.

On behalf of the Head of State, the Program for the Development of Productive Employment and Mass Entrepreneurship has been developed and is being implemented, taking into account business proposals voiced by representatives of the National Chamber of Entrepreneurs. The volume of microcredit has been expanded, there is the possibility of guaranteeing by the state with insufficient collateral for potential entrepreneurs. In total, within the framework of the Program for the Development of Productive Employment and Mass Entrepreneurship, about half a million citizens are supported, of which 315,000 are employed for permanent jobs.

In 2017, 7,200 microcredits were issued for 32 billion tenge. This year, under the Five Social Initiatives of the Head of State, the expenditures for the microcredit budget will be increased to 62 billion tenge. Microcredits will receive 14 thousand people.

In his speech, the Prime Minister highlighted the completion of the transition period envisaged by the law on the NCE. Now the Government will withdraw from the membership of the National Chamber. The head of the Cabinet stressed that close and constructive work is important at a new stage, and for this there is a united team today, there is a vision of what to do in order for business to develop.

"Now Atameken is starting a new stage of its work. We wish you a good journey, Atameken” said Bakytzhan Sagintayev.

Within the framework of the Congress, Prime Minister Bakytzhan Sagintayev and Chairman of the Presidium of the Atameken Timur Kulibayev signed an Agreement on Cooperation between the Government and the National Chamber of Entrepreneurs, which defines a new mechanism for cooperation and joint activity.

Four important results of the joint work of the state and Atameken Chamber for five years:

The number of active SMEs increased by 34% to 1.1 million (2012 — 888.2 thousand).
The gross added value of SMEs increased 2.5 times and amounted to 13.3 trillion tenge (2012 — 5.3 trillion tenge).
The production of SMEs has more than doubled (in nominal terms) and amounted to 21.1 trillion tenge in 2017.
The number of employees in the business sector grew by more than 700 thousand people. Now in the SME there are 3.1 million people. This is 35% of the total economically active population (8.9 million people).