AMM Congress upgrade: Discussions, networking, hackathon

8th February 2019

In summer 2019 Astana will once again become a central platform to discuss topical issues of the mining industry - on June 12-13 the Anniversary Astana Mining&Metallurgy (AMM) Congress will be held in an entirely new format.  The Hilton Astana Hotel present in the territory of the EXPO-2017 Exhibition complex will host the renewed event.

An auspicious for Kazakhstan the AMM Congress will change its format from presentation to discussion platform.  More than 60 global brands, including government leaders and public officials, renowned scholars, Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) of some major companies will discuss with delegates the main issues in the mining and metallurgical industry and growth prospects.

The main feature of the AMM Congress is a digitalization and investment horizons.  The program will include workshops and panel discussions on various issues, including "Digitalisation of mining and processing, increase of efficiency of production processes in the mining and metallurgical complex"; "Attract investments and replenishment of mineral resources base"; "Benefits of legal regulation in the new Subsoil and Subsoil Use Code"; "Investment opportunities of Kazakhstan for prospective investors'.  Also, the Big 4 Companies will give the review of the Mining industry in their countries, prepared specially for AMM.

The relevance of topics chosen is proved by the current occurrences and development trends in the Mining and Metallurgical Complex of Kazakhstan, as well as by the outcomes of the World Mining Congress, under whose auspices the AMM was held in June 2018. 

We want to notice that the National Bank of Mineral Resources Data is now being established within the frame of the Digital Kazakhstan Program to increase the quality of the geological database and infrastructure.  This system which combines all historical geological data and represents them in the up to date format will provide for transparency of the state bodies’ and subsoil user’s activities, as well as for validity of the information submitted for investors, which will expand the investment inflow.  Besides, an international accredited commercial laboratory is now being established in Karaganda. It meets all world standards and allows an investor to conduct studies directly in Kazakhstan.

The efforts of Kazakhstan in attracting of investments bear their fruit. 
Our Republic ranks 24th in the Fraser Institute's ranking, which annually assesses investment attractiveness of countries in the field of Mining and Subsoil Use.  The geological exploration of Kazakhstan has already attracted such global leaders as Rio Tinto, Iluka, Yildirim Group, ULMUS Fund, and others.  During the last three years,  a massive work on modification of the legislative framework has been completed.  The Ministry of Investments and Development of the Republic of Kazakhstan has initiated action on a transition of old contracts into the new modes and plans to continue modifications in the part of transitional provisions of the Code.

Kazakhstan has prospective geological reserves of minerals with the growing demand on it.  As Zhenis Kassymbek, the Minister of investments and development of the Republic of Kazakhstan has noticed, recently demand on rare earth metals has strengthened, there were changes in the commodity prices (cobalt, palladium, lithium were doubled in prices). Experts forecast significant growth for gallium, scandium, indium and other rare metals.  To increase the competitiveness of Kazakhstan in this direction, there is a need to conduct some prospecting works and, respectively, increase financing.  The Minister has informed that 1.2 mln.sq.meters are available in Kazakhstan for geological studies and only 21% of them are studied at the required level.  In this regard, Kazakhstan is interested in the attraction of investments into prospecting via junior companies.  The application process has already been started for more than 85 thousand blocks situated on 197 thousand sq.meters. The year 2019 will see additional blocks presented according to this principle.

Given the mentioned above and the fact, that the world actively promotes 4.0 industrial standards, the AMM Congress’ Organisers increasingly tend to implement new approaches to conduct all arrangements of the event.  The quality stuffing of programmes, change of format will allow to realize to the full all acute issues of the industry and find ways for their solution.  AMM 2019 will open multiple platforms for dialogues and include networking, hackathon, and Gold Gefest competition, which will bring the AMM Congress to an entirely new level and will definitely attract more experts, businesspeople, specialists, and scholars.