President unveils location of new Kazakhstan mega-city

    President Nursultan Nazarbayev has revealed which Kazakhstani city will become the next mega-city, Tengrinews.kz reports, citing his Twitter account.
    “Kazakhstan will be forging ahead to further develop Almaty and Astana. Shymkent in the South of Kazakhstan and another city in the west of the country could be transformed into mega-cities as well,” a news statement quoted President Nazarbayev as saying during his recent working trip to South Kazakhstan.
    Kazakhstan will see another two cities similar to Astana and Almaty created shortly, Tengrinews.kz reported, citing Nazarbayev as saying September 10.
    “We have set the goal to create another two megapolises, as well as a number of smart green cities,” the president said while speaking at the Eurasia Emerging Markets Forum in Astana on September 10.
    “Our choice is to develop urban agglomerations as powerful points of growth. In the long term we plan to shape urban agglomerations of a global scale,” he said.
    As of today, there are two mega-cities in Kazakhstan – the capital city Astana and Almaty. The population of Almaty is close to 1.5 million, with the population of Astana reaching 1 million, the president explained, www.tengrinews.kz reports.