Conclusions on the Creotalents project

Dear friends,

Creotalents project team (Center of entrepreneurship CACTLE of L.N. Gumilyov ENU, University of Birmingham (UK) and Oxford Brooks University (UK)) organized a workshop with the key stakeholders of the Creative Industries in Kazakhstan (15th of April, 2019). Insightful presentations and discussions have informed the development of several conclusions that could help to set a clear direction for policy making in Kazakhstan.

Strategic vision

• Capacity development in the Creative Industries requires a holistic, collaborative and collective approach with the involvement of different stakeholders including government and private sector representatives, entrepreneurs, academics and students, and the local community.
• Creative Industries are fragmented; different sectors constitute Creative Industries. There is a clear need in the region to map out which sectors of the Creative Industries have the potential for development. Having a clear focus will help to channel and manage the resources (human, financial, social/cultural) effectively for the development of the Creative Industries. It will also help with the governance of the Creative Industries.
• The region needs to identify its current and potential markets for the Creative Industries; the local market could help with the early stages of the development of the Creative Industries. However, in the longer term, the export capacity of the Creative Industries should be considered and developed further. For example, we have identified the Eurasian Economic Union as a potential market for the Creative Industries.
• The region needs to develop a holistic vision for the Creative Industries, which should recognize both economic and socio-cultural dimensions. This would place the Creative Industries ‘at the heart of the society for the generation of new ideas, collective ownership and diffusion of innovations, which would thus create a new culture of ‘creativity’ with local authenticity.
• Creative Industries and Entrepreneurship could empower different groups in the society, in particular women and youth. This in turn would increase employability and also contribute to the competitiveness of regional economy.
• The region could utilize its full potential in the Creative Industries through embedding ‘creativity’ in its educational system (i.e. early school education as well as higher education). This could help to influence the existing culture and develop a new culture of ‘creativity’ for the country.

We are keen to ‘co-create creative spark ideas’ by working closely with different stakeholders including policy makers, practitioners, small business associations, entrepreneurs and the community. We would therefore appreciate if you could get back to us with your comments and suggestions in order to help us to shape this document further.

Professor Levent Altinay, Dr Endrit Kromidha and Dr Armiyash Nurmagambetova

Creotalents Creative Spark Team