Total trade
East Kazakhstan Region’s total trade rose 33.3% to $2.93 billion in H1 2026. Unusually, exports and imports grew almost in lockstep, up 33.2% and 33.4% respectively. The region accounted for 4.4% of Kazakhstan’s exports, 3.7% of imports and 4.1% of total trade.
Trade with Russia nearly doubled to $850.2 million, up 92.0%, allowing it to overtake China, where turnover reached $664.3 million after growing 16.0%. This is a rare reversal. Kyrgyzstan, up 49.2%, Türkiye, up 110.4%, and the United Kingdom, up 125.7%, also expanded far faster than the average.
Exports
Exports rose 33.2% to $1.78 billion. Food products accounted for 13.9% and increased 18.7%.
This is a region of non-ferrous and precious metals: silver, zinc, gold and copper cathodes. Sunflower oil is the unexpected companion in this export mix.
Silver is increasingly routed through the United Kingdom and Hong Kong, which together account for 63%, rather than sold directly to China. This looks like a genuine and rapidly expanding link to precious-metals trading through the London market, not a one-off deal. The 127% rise in shipments to the United Kingdom and the emergence of Hong Kong as a new buyer both represent fresh demand this year. Gold, meanwhile, goes entirely to Kyrgyzstan at every point examined. Such an absolute share is more suggestive of toll refining at a specific Kyrgyz facility than a conventional end market: Kyrgyzstan appears to be a processing transit point rather than the ultimate buyer.
Imports
Imports rose 33.4% to $1.15 billion. Food products accounted for just 5.1%.
Enriched uranium and zinc, silver and copper ores dominate the import mix. The region buys additional volumes of the same raw materials that it processes and exports.
Imports of enriched uranium jumped to $381.4 million in 2025 from a steady $54-111 million a year over the previous decade. Russia overtook China as the main supplier for the first time since 2017, marking a genuine change in the supply structure for strategic nuclear-fuel material rather than statistical noise. Russia also supplies almost the entire imported ore basket, including zinc, silver, copper and lead. The region’s metallurgical plants, including Kazzinc, consistently purchased Russian ore to supplement domestic production throughout 2015-2025. This is a long-established dependency, not a new trend.
East Kazakhstan stands out because exports and imports grew almost in parallel, by around 33%, reflecting the region’s dual role. It is both a metals exporter, with silver, zinc and copper increasingly routed through London, Hong Kong and Türkiye rather than only China, and a smelting hub that purchases Russian ore to support those same export flows. The shift in enriched uranium supplies from China to Russia also deserves attention: it is modest in scale but strategically significant.
National Bureau of Economic Research specifically for EconomyKZ.org
