The festival of Kazakh Culture in the Russian capital continued the recently established tradition between our countries — in December 2023, the Days of Culture of Moscow were held in the capital of Kazakhstan. The events in Moscow were held in two directions — business and cultural. First, negotiations were held between members of the government of Moscow and the Maslikhat of Astana (legislative assembly), then a round table on cultural cooperation and a meeting of representatives of the tourism business of the two capitals. Our company was also invited to the delegation from Astana. Alexey Pogodaev, Managing Director of Crocos Group (CityPASS), made a presentation on the topic: “Traveling to Kazakhstan through digital technologies“. The report included trends in TravelTech, the results of CityPASS and RedBus projects in Kazakhstan. Also, the Russian tourism business was offered cooperation and presented a specialized b2b product – corporate CityPASS Bussiness cards.
The business part of the Days of Culture in Astana was with a tourist bias. According to the head of the Department for Investment and Business Development of Astana, Khalel Akimzhanov, Astana residents came to acquaint the Russian side with the tourist potential of Astana and establish direct contacts between companies engaged in tourism in the Kazakh capital with colleagues from Russia.
“Astana as the capital is a very young city, one of the fastest growing cities in Central Asia. Every year, the population of the Kazakh capital grows by 60-70 thousand people. The pace of construction and changes is enormous. To date, Astana has a pool of annual cultural events, the last of which attracted about 12 thousand foreign tourists, of which 8 thousand are Russians. We focus on Russian tourists and their participation in festivals,“ Akimzhanov said.
In addition, according to him, many Kazakhstani international companies are interested in working with Russian partners and are ready to hold joint events. “In this sense, Astana looks the most acceptable from the point of view of prices, from the point of view of cultural exchange and from the point of view of interaction with government agencies,“ Khalel Akimzhanov summed up.
