This summer representatives of Kainar University visited their partners at Reading University as part of the British Council INSPIRE project and aimed at strengthening academic and research collaboration between universities in Kazakhstan and UK. Within the visit British-Kazakh Society hosted a seminar on "Local Content Development in Kazakhstan" in the House of Lords. The government of Kazakhstan is increasingly concerned with ensuring that existing natural resource endowments generate wider economic benefits and the policy of local content development is one of its priorities. The seminar was  addressed by H.E. K. Abusseitov, Ambassador of the Republic of Kazakhstan to the UK and by Lord Fraser of Carmyllie ,Q.C. the Chairman of the British-Kazakh Society.

The keynote speaker of the seminar Professor Yelena Kalyuzhnova who is head of the Centre for Euro-Asian Studies at Reading University presented the results of the study which was done by the Centre for Euro-Asian Studies and Kainar University on the main aspects of the local content policy in Kazakhstan. This study is supported by the INSIRE project of the British Council.  The speakers included Mr Nigel Gould-Davies, VP Policy and Corporate Affairs, BG Kazakhstan, Mr Julian Lee, The Centre for Global Energy Studies, and Mr Peter Ormerod, Vice President of Strategic Opportunities, Promethean. Professor Yerengaip Omarov, Rector of Kainar University, Professor Abdizhapar Saparbayev, Head of Economic Faculty of Kainar University and Dr Christian Nygaard of The Centre for Euro-Asian Studies, the University of Reading took part at the discussion and formulation of the policy recommendations. It was a wide participation of the leading businessmen, academics and policy formers at the seminar. The main findings and conclusions of the discussion were passed to the Kazakh National State Agency on Local Content Development. It was a very interesting and fruitful event.