The EBRD and Kazakhstan signed a new five-year Enhanced Partnership Framework Arrangement at the Bank's Annual Meeting in Riga on Saturday. The agreement, signed by Kazakhstan's Ministry of Finance and the EBRD, builds on a previous framework from 2021 and sets the terms of joint activity through 2030.
The framework identifies three focal areas: building economic resilience through private sector development — including micro, small and medium-sized enterprises and foreign direct investment; advancing the low-carbon transition; and supporting connectivity infrastructure, which in Kazakhstan's case means the Middle Corridor and Aktau port modernisation. Investment instruments, grants, technical assistance, and policy dialogue are all covered under the agreement.
Cumulative EBRD investment in Kazakhstan now exceeds €10 billion. The 2025 annual deployment was $440 million. The 2030 framework sets the trajectory for the next cycle.
The EBRD's updated Regional Economic Prospects, launched at the Annual Meeting on June 7, revised Kazakhstan's 2026 growth forecast upward. Central Asia as a region continues to outperform the Bank's own projections — the 2025 outturn of approximately 6.9% beat the September 2025 forecast, and the 2026 projection now stands at 5.6%, up from 5.2% in the February edition.
The governance conditionality framework endorsed at the Governors' plenary on June 6 will apply to Kazakhstan under the new EPFA. That means EBRD lending terms will increasingly incorporate rule of law, anti-corruption benchmarks, and regulatory transparency indicators. For Astana, which has been running large-scale investment programmes financed partly through multilateral channels, this is a structural shift in the terms of engagement — not a dealbreaker, but a new condition to manage.
CAW note
The EPFA is a framework, not a committed investment amount. The specific projects and volumes will be negotiated annually within the 2030 envelope. The Aktau port package (€45 million EBRD-EU) is already at implementation stage and sits inside this framework. The next concrete data point: June 23 Middle Corridor high-level meeting, where EBRD corridor commitments are expected to be discussed alongside EU Global Gateway instruments.