Kazakhstan Advances AI Development Amid Environmental and Human Rights Concerns

Kazakhstan is accelerating its artificial intelligence (AI) development, with experts cautioning about potential impacts on the environment and human rights. A recent directors' meeting of Samruk-Kazyna, Kazakhstan’s sovereign wealth fund, featured a young woman representing the company’s new AI program, SKAI, which is the first AI with voting rights aimed at enhancing transparency and governance. President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev has declared 2026 as the 'Year of Digitalisation and Artificial Intelligence' to implement advanced technologies across various sectors, enhance skills, promote startups, and develop Kazakh-language technologies. In 2025, the government established a Ministry of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Development and approved an action plan extending to 2029 that includes initiatives for AI literacy in educational institutions and the digitalisation of healthcare and public services. Kazakhstan became the second jurisdiction after the European Union to pass a law governing AI in 2025. The capital, Astana, features a new AI museum and the Astana Hub, the largest innovation cluster in Central Asia, where hundreds of schoolchildren receive free training in programming and AI. The hub's managing director, Valeria Tio, noted that the candidate selection process is competitive, with less than 2% of applicants accepted into the program. Eighteen months into the Tomorrow School initiative, 500 individuals have been trained, with some securing employment. The hub also supports startups and has partnered with international hubs, offering tax incentives to its residents. Astana Hub has facilitated the emergence of Kazakhstan’s first unicorn company, Higgsfield, valued at over $1 billion. Nazarbayev University hosts the Institute of Smart Systems and Artificial Intelligence, which operates a supercomputer and has developed a Kazakh-language AI model, MagniSoz, launched in December 2024. Despite advancements, concerns have been raised regarding the environmental impact of large data centers and the enforcement of human rights protections in AI legislation. Tlegen Kuandykov from CAPS Unlock highlighted the need for transparency in environmental assessments and the potential misuse of data, particularly regarding biometric identification and facial recognition technologies.