Businesses attending yesterday’s Kazakh–Chinese Business Council meeting in Astana signed some 40 deals worth a total of $3.7bn, news agency Kazinform reports.

The event attracted around 500 representatives, including more than 50 of China’s largest companies.

Samruk Kazyna, Kazakhstan’s sovereign wealth fund signed 16 agreements with Chinese partners covering, among other things, the production of wind turbines and the construction of a container hub in Aktau, a Kazakh port on the Caspian Sea.

Another deal mentioned by Kazinform was a waste-to-energy plant, to be jointly developed by Astana Akimat, Kazakh contractor Bazis-A, Shenzhen Energy and China State Construction Engineering Corporation.

The two sides also planned to launch a high-tech wheat-processing plant in the Kostanai Region of north Kazakhstan in 2027.

The Qostanay Grain Industry facility is expected to employ 600 people and to improve the country’s food security and export potential.

It is envisaged that the plant will process 430,000 tonnes of Kazakhstan’s 16 million tonne wheat harvest. As well as flour, it will produce amino acids, bioethanol, gluten, animal feed and bran.

China is Kazakhstan’s largest foreign trade partner. In the first quarter of this year, trade hit $6.3bn. Last year, the total volume of trade grew 30% year on year to reach $32bn.