The mutual tourist flow between Russia and Kazakhstan continues to grow, according to the Ministry of Economic Development

Recently, there has been a significant increase in mutual tourist trips between Russia and Kazakhstan. So, in 2022, the number of trips of Russian citizens to Kazakhstan amounted to 2.4 million people, and about 1.7 million tourists from Kazakhstan visited Russia. In 9 months of 2023, the number of trips from Kazakhstan exceeded 1.6 million trips, the tourist flow from Russia to Kazakhstan amounted to 2.2 million people. This was announced on its website by the Ministry of Economic Development of Russia with reference to Deputy head of the department Dmitry Volvach.

"The growth of mutual tourist trips between our countries will continue. There are all the necessary prerequisites and conditions for this – strong historical ties, the absence of a language barrier, friendly relations between our peoples, the presence of direct flights and a visa–free regime," Volvach's words are quoted in the message.

The Deputy Minister noted that in 2023-2024 the city of Almaty was declared the tourist and cultural capital of the SCO. According to him, Russia is ready for further active work to promote tourism cooperation with Kazakhstan.

"In Russia, Kazakhstan ranks third among the popular destinations to visit, after Abkhazia and Turkey. Russia, in turn, ranks first in terms of the number of tourists in Kazakhstan," he said.

A joint initiative to create a Eurasian Alliance of mountain resorts, which includes the Russian Rosa Khutor, the Kazakh Shymkent, the Uzbek Amirsoy and the Azerbaijani Shahdag, is also aimed at developing the tourist flow between the two countries.

"The parties hope that the creation of the alliance will promote the best practices and brands of mountain resorts, form new tourism products and improve joint work on the development of mountain tourism," the message says.

One of the joint initiatives to promote outdoor activities and unique mountain resorts in Eurasia has already been recognized by foreign colleagues, the Ministry of Economic Development noted.

We are talking about creating an Interstate tourist mountain route. The program includes eight key projects.

"Kazakh and Russian tourists have already fallen in love with our joint tourist routes, such as the "Flashed Meteor" tour with visits to Omsk, Pavlodar and Almaty, the route along the Chagan River in the Orenburg region, departure to the "Blue Lakes" in the Tyumen region. At the moment, we are negotiating the creation of national tourist routes bordering Kazakhstan. Two such routes are already available for tourists – "Hello Altai!" on the border with the Altai Territory and "Germans of the Volga region" on the border with the Saratov region," Volvach said.

In addition, Russia and Kazakhstan, according to him, are interested in developing a cross-border tourist zone in the area of Mount Belukha. At the moment, the parties are working on a draft intergovernmental agreement on the special legal status of crossing the Russian-Kazakh border.