Turkey's Safi Holding could invest up to $200 mln in building Kazakhstan sugar refinery

ASTANA. July 24 (Interfax) - Turkey's Safi Holding plans to build a sugar refinery in Kazakhstan with a production capacity of up to 140,000 tonnes of sugar per year, the press service of the Kazakh Ministry of Agriculture reported.

The press service said that Kazakh Minister of Agriculture Aidarbek Saparov and Safi Holding CEO Safi Atakan had discussed the construction of the refinery during talks.

The refinery will have the capacity to process 1 million tonnes of sugar beet per year. A total of $150-200 million has been invested in the project.

The investor is in the process of choosing a region in which to build the production facility.

Kazakhstan currently has four functioning sugar refineries in Taraz, Merke, Aksu and Koksu, all in the south. They have a collective daily processing capacity of 8,700 tonnes of sugar beet and 2,400 tonnes of raw sugarcane.

In 2024, Kazakhstan's beet harvest doubled to about 1.3 million tonnes, with an average yield of 535.5 centners per hectare (c/ha).

Safi Holding said on its website that it was founded in 1965 and was initially active in the mining industry. In 2000, the holding expanded its solid fuel dealership chain to cover the whole of Turkey. It is now active in other areas including shipping, port operations, sea transportation, sugar production and trade.