Kazakhstan is widely recognised as the world's leading uranium producer and exporter and as a top-10 oil exporter. But for many of its neighbours, the fact that the country is also a leading and flourishing exporter of grain is equally, if not more, important.

However, Kazakhstan is in fact increasingly moving beyond its neighbours, finding additional markets for its grain commodities. These now include countries in North Africa, the Middle East, Europe and East Asia.

Abundant harvests

Kazakhstan’s Agriculture Minister Aidarbek Saparov told a government meeting on November 4 that this year’s harvest amounted to some 27.1mn tonnes of grain.

“This year has been record-breaking not only for grain, but also for high-yield and high-demand crops such as legumes and oilseeds…,” Saparov said.

The 27.1mn tonnes gathered breaks the previous record, set last year, of 26.7mn tonnes.

The latest record grain harvest is very good news for other countries in the region, most of which import grain from Kazakhstan.

Wheat makes up the majority of  Kazakhstan’s grain, at between 70% and 80%, with barley following at somewhere around 10-12%. The other grains are corn, rice, oats, miller, buckwheat and rye.

This year’s wheat harvest was 20.3mn tonnes, with barley weighing in with 4mn tonnes.

Growing list of customers

From September 2024 to April 2025, Kazakhstan’s grain exports to neighbours jumped by 58% compared to the same 2023-2024 period.

A scene in Kokshetau in northern Afghanistan's Akmola Region. With grain in abundance, Kazakhstan has become a major regional exporter of the vital commodity that is now reaching other continents with shipments (Breshuk, cc, public domain).

Uzbekistan was the biggest buyer, importing 2.7mn tonnes, up 29.7% y/y. Kyrgyzstan purchased 181,000 tonnes, mostly wheat, twice the amount it imported in 2023-2024. Tajikistan bought 51% more, taking 1.1mn tonnes.

Perhaps the country that benefits the most from having such a grain-rich neighbour is crisis-ravaged Afghanistan. Afghanistan purchased 270,000 tonnes of desperately-needed grain from Kazakhstan in 2024-2025.

At the opening of the third annual Afghan Goods Exhibition in Shymkent, Kazakhstan in late October, Serik Zhumangarin, the Kazakh Minister of National Economy, said wheat exports to Afghanistan nearly tripled in the first eight months of 2025, while sunflower oil exports more than tripled.

Iran has experienced periods of terribly severe drought in recent years and has very much needed to import wheat. Kazakhstan sold Iran 555,200 tonnes in 2021 and 560,000 tonnes in 2022. Sufficient rain returned in 2023 and Iran purchased only 66,600 tonnes of Kazakh wheat that year, but the respite was short and, in 2024, Iran’s imports of Kazakh wheat climbed to 427,500 tonnes.

In August, Ataollah Hashemi, the head of Iran’s National Syndicate of Wheat Farmers, said drought was again causing shortfalls in agricultural production and Iran would need to import some 4.5mn tonnes of wheat before March next year.

Unlike Iran, Kazakhstan has not struggled with water resources for agriculture this year, partly thanks to floods two years ago that refilled lakes and reservoirs (Credit: Saltanat-Alikhanov, cc-by-sa 4.0).

In January, Kazakh Agriculture Minister Saparov met with the head of Iranian investment firm Fawakeh Trading Company, who told Saparov that Iran was interested in importing up to 3mn tonnes of wheat from Kazakhstan.

Iran also buys wheat from Russia and there has been no recent indication that the Iranians are seeking to buy 3mn tonnes  of Kazakh wheat in the coming months. But Kazakhstan will certainly be one of Iran’s primary sources for wheat imports as its ongoing devastating drought continues.

A wheat field in Iran. Kazakhstan has become a primary source of grain to the Iranians (Credit: Mostafa Hassanzadeh, Tasnim news agency, cc-by-sa 4.0).

Kazakhstan also exports wheat to its eastern giant neighbour China. In 2023, Kazakhstan shipped some 2.2mn tonnes of wheat, barley, soybeans, flax and sunflower seeds to the Chinese market.

In July 2024, Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev  said Kazakhstan could increase exports of wheat to China to 2mn tonnes; however, China introduced new tariffs on wheat imports one month later and Kazakh grain exports to the country of 1.4bn dropped sharply for the rest of 2024.

Kazakhstan also sells wheat to Azerbaijan. It shipped the South Caucasus country some 569,000 tonnes during September 2024 to April 2025. That was more than twice the amount Kazakhstan sold to Azerbaijan from September 2023 to April 2024.

Saparov mentioned on November 4 that grain was also being delivered to Armenia and Georgia. The shipments to Armenia are the first since the Soviet Union collapsed. Thanks to improved relations between Yerevan and Baku, they can be transshipped via Azerbaijan to the Armenians.

Outside of Kazakhstan’s region, sales of the country’s wheat are expanding to countries quite far away.

Kazakhstan, for instance, exports high-quality durum wheat to Turkey. In mid-October, Agriculture Minister Saparov met with Turkish Agriculture Minister Ibrahim Yumakli. Among the topics discussed was a “grain hub” based near Baku. Reports published after the two ministers’ meeting said Kazakhstan was positioning itself to become the exclusive supplier of durum wheat to Turkey.

The exact amount of Turkey’s imports of Kazakh grain is unclear, though a recent report said Kazakhstan could increase grain exports to Turkey to 1mn tonnes in the near future.

Kazakhstan has already exported durum wheat to Italy. Between September 2024 and May 2025, it exported some 355,000 tonnes of the grain to the Italian market. Durum is especially well-suited for making pasta (and coucous).

In his comments on November 4, Saparov said shipments of Kazakh grain have also started to Belgium, Portugal, Poland, Norway, the United Kingdom, Vietnam and the United Arab Emirates.

There are also reports that Kazakhstan is shipping grain to Morocco and Algeria.

Shipping networks expand

The bumper grain crops of the last two years have been a boon for Kazakhstan but the increased ability to transport grain has also played a key role in boosting Kazakhstan’s grain exports.

Agriculture Minister Sapatov said grain exports last season came to some 13.4mn tonnes, marking a 47% y/y expansion.

Just a few years ago, Kazakhstan might have found it difficult to ship such big volumes of grain to customers.

However, since Russia launched its full-scale war on Ukraine in February 2022, Kazakhstan, in cooperation with international partners, has been working energetically to expand and improve road and railway networks and ports and add vessels to its Caspian Sea cargo fleet.

Europe and China are increasingly using the Middle Corridor, sometimes called the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TITR), for trade. The countries of Central Asia and the South Caucasus are benefitting from the expansion of this East-West trade route that crosses Kazakhstan.

Kazakhstan, Central Asia’s largest economy, is now much better connected by rail to all immediate neighbours and by railway branches through Uzbekistan to Afghanistan, and through Turkmenistan to Iran (and from there to Turkey). New railways and extensions to existing railway lines are already under construction.

Kazakhstan is expanding its Caspian Sea cargo fleet (Credit: Farid Mernissi, cc-by-sa 4.0).

Kazakhstan continues to improve and expand operations at its Caspian ports of Aktau and Kuryk, which ship increasing volumes of goods to Azerbaijan and Iran. Work is under way at Kuryk to build a grain terminal that eventually could handle 1.5mn tonnes of grain annually.

As is true with agricultural exports all over the world, Kazakhstan’s grain harvests depend on the weather and just four years ago many parts of the country were experiencing severe drought. Notably, the devastating floods that hit large areas of the country in the first half of 2024 had the benefit of filling many of Kazakhstan’s reservoirs and replenishing some lakes that had been dried out for decades.

Water has not been a major issue to the Kazakhs for the last two years, but the broader Central Asian region is one of the hardest hit regions in the world in terms of climate change.

For now, Kazakhstan’s plans call for grain exports this coming season to be at least as high as last season. Saparov said almost 2.2mn tonnes of this year’s harvest has already been exported, with the figure representing a jump of 21% y/y.

Kazakhstan very much remains a major supplier to the world of uranium and oil, but it is the country’s grain exports that are far more important at mealtime in many countries.