Kazakhstan News Agency, Moscow, Eurasian Economic Commission Trade Minister Srepnev said at a press conference in Moscow that since Russia’s accession to the WTO in August 2012, the most obvious change in imports among the three countries in the Customs Union is Kazakhstan. Kazakhstan’s import growth reached 11.2%, which is much higher than the average import growth rate of customs union countries. Kazakhstan’s imports mainly come from China, accounting for nearly 1/3 of Kazakhstan’s total import value. Kazakhstan’s imports of textile products and shoes have increased significantly. Among them, clothing imports doubled as a whole, but men’s tops and women’s tops nearly tripled; knitted products doubled. In addition, some food imports have grown rapidly.
Srepnev also pointed out that there has been an increase in inaccurate declarations of some commodities in Kazakhstan. For example, shoes are often declared as goods with lower tariff numbers and then sold in the customs union market, which reduces the role of the customs union in unifying tariff policies.
