GEWR'25

West Dala became a partner of the largest Eurasian forum on waste management and renewable energy — the GREEN ENERGY & WASTE RECYCLING FORUM (GEWR). In its 20th anniversary year, our company continues to support all initiatives of the event organizer — KazWaste Association, which serves as a representative body for the waste management industry. During the plenary session on the first day of the forum, it was noted that 202 companies in Kazakhstan currently hold licenses for the processing, utilization, destruction, and disposal of hazardous waste. Additionally, 1,722 enterprises have submitted notifications to begin operations related to the collection, sorting, transportation, recovery, or destruction of non-hazardous waste. This reflects the scale of the sector. However, many of these companies remain vulnerable. Systemic government support is still lacking.

Vera Mustafina, Executive Director of KazWaste, stated: “The industrial waste recycling sector is developing more actively, but even here we see a concerning trend. Companies are increasingly losing long-term contracts, as clients prioritize short-term tenders with the lowest possible price. This undermines business sustainability, lowers service quality, and poses risks to both environmental and industrial safety.”

Working sessions also addressed challenges in industrial waste management and professional workforce development. Our colleagues — Rustam Almenbetov, Deputy Head of the Production Department, and Ainagul Sagiyeva, Lead Environmental Specialist — served as speakers during these discussions.

Rustam Almanbetov highlighted relevant problems from a practitioner’s perspective. For example, our company often faces prolonged timelines for obtaining environmental permits and undergoing procedures—sometimes up to six months or more. At the forum, West Dala proposed reducing these timelines to 3 months for waste processing companies and eliminating public hearings at the environmental permit stage. Rustam Almanbetov also raised the issue of storage periods for specific types of waste (such as mercury, glass, etc.). Instead of a fixed 6-month period, he suggested introducing flexible timelines depending on the availability of infrastructure, as well as developing a National Strategy for the Disposal of Specific Waste.
Other proposals from our company included:

1. Allowing accumulation and disposal standards to be set not by waste codes but by waste names, provided the appropriate technologies and capacities are available.
2. Introducing differentiated standards for treated water quality.
3. Taking into account the further intended use of treated wastewater.
4. Legally obligating waste generators and passport developers to be responsible for the data provided in waste passports.
5. Legally obligating laboratories to be responsible for the results of analyses.

Rustam Almanbetov emphasized that, overall, legislation should be flexible and adaptive, taking into account the specifics of real-world conditions—such as waste composition, local technologies, and geography.

Ainagul Sagiyeva highlighted the company’s contribution to professional training through the development of dual education with the Atyrau University of Oil and Gas named after S. Utebayev, partnership in educational programs with the Atyrau University named after Kh. Dosmukhamedov, and cooperation with the Career Center of Atyrau within the framework of the state program “Youth Practice”.

In her speech, our colleague elaborated on the shortage of qualified personnel in the waste management, the most in-demand specialists, and the key skills required. During the discussion, I proposed several initiatives on behalf of our company:

• To introduce educational programs on waste management in universities across Kazakhstan;
• To organize training programs for in-demand specializations in vocational and technical institutions;
• To promote the importance of waste management and sorting among the general public through school programs, NGOs, and mass media.
It is also crucial to communicate the demand for professions that are scarce in the waste management sector to the target audience – future graduates and applicants, as well as the leadership of relevant higher and vocational educational institutions.

For 9 years, the GEWR Forum has remained the largest platform in Central Asia for discussing waste management issues. This year, the Forum once again confirmed its status as the leading Waste & Green Energy platform in the region. Importantly, participants established new connections and exchanged practices, while discussions on mitigating climate and environmental challenges became more systemic. We thank the organizers of the GEWR Forum for successfully delivering such a large-scale and relevant event in the field of waste management.