Almaty plans to enter world’s top 100 cities

Almaty intends to enter world’s TOP-100 cities. Such an ambitious task is set by the leadership of the metropolis. To achieve this aim, it is necessary to change the structure of the urban economy, Almaty Mayor Bakytzhan Sagintayev reported at a briefing. If presently the main income comes from the trade component, now completely different sectors of development need to be focused on. These, according to Sagintayev, include 10 areas: cinema, animation, ballet, fashion, e-sports, architecture and other creative industries.

“We brought together all the representatives of our city’s creative industry and we created a council, started to move: where and how do we start? And we decided that each of 8 districts should have its own creative hub so that the young people who live there didn’t have to trip across the city. We started from Alatau district - a new one in Almaty. It turned out there is a very good three-storey building. We immediately decided that we would make a creative hub in this building,” Sagintayev said.

Today, this hub is visited by almost 1,000 people. At the same time, now representatives of the Department of creative industries, the first one in Kazakhstan, are working on new projects. For example, they are creating a new design for a tram depot and much more.

Translation by Saule Mukhamejanova

Editing by Galiya Khassenkhanova