Some residents of Kazakhstan will be exempt from submitting declarations.

Last week, President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev stated that the requirement for the remaining categories of Kazakhstanis to submit declarations in 2025 raises doubts, as everything is already digitized.

Today, in the government cabinet, Finance Minister Madi Takiyev reported that as of now, 4.8 million people have already entered the universal declaration system in the first three stages, including civil servants, heads and founders of commercial organizations, the quasi-state sector, and their spouses.

He proposed to exempt the remaining 8 million Kazakhstanis who were supposed to submit declarations in 2025, which includes employees of private entities, pensioners, homemakers, students, and others. This exemption will affect more than 90% of individuals.

Declaration is proposed to be maintained for the following category of individuals:

"Currently, more than 4 million people are submitting declarations. Among them are civil servants, representatives of the quasi-state sector, and businesses. It was planned that in 2025, all other categories of citizens would submit declarations. This raised concerns among the population, which was noted by the head of state.

"As of today, the databases of state agencies are maximally digitized. Financial and currency control has been strengthened, and data exchange on accounts has been established within the framework of international agreements, while digital services are widely available, therefore, there is overall information on the assets of individuals.

"To this end, the ministries of finance and digitalization should ensure the acquisition of information from all digital databases, including second-tier banks, for the registration and tax control. Therefore, I support the Finance Minister's proposal to exempt the remaining categories of citizens from the mandatory submission of asset declarations in 2025," said Prime Minister Olzhas Bektenov, endorsing Takiyev's proposal.

It is worth noting that earlier a petition appeared online proposing to cancel or postpone the next stages of the universal declaration of the population. The petition's authors claimed that Kazakhstan is sufficiently digitized for state revenue agencies to see all banking transactions within the country.

Later, Tokayev instructed to reconsider the approach to universal declaration. He noted that more than 4 million people have already submitted declarations. It was planned that next year, the declaration would involve another 8 million citizens.

"However, it should be taken into account that the concept of universal income declaration was adopted 14 years ago. During this time, the country has made significant progress in the fields of digitalization and fintech.

"(...) In view of these large-scale changes, the question arises about the feasibility of citizens submitting declarations who fall under the fourth and final stage. The government needs to work on a solution to this issue," the president emphasized.

It is important to remember that universal declaration in Kazakhstan is being introduced in 4 stages.

Starting from January 1, 2021, incomes are declared:

Starting from January 1, 2023:

Starting from January 1, 2024:

Starting from January 1, 2025, all remaining categories of citizens were supposed to submit declarations. It was reported that accounts would be blocked for those Kazakhstanis who fail to submit declarations.

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