Netherlands set to invest €100 million in shipyard in Kazakhstan

The international shipbuilding company Damen Shipyards Group, a Dutch defense, shipbuilding and engineering conglomerate, will invest approximately €100 million in the construction of a shipyard in Kazakhstan’s Caspian coast, according to the authorities of the Mangystau region.

The announcement followed the Kazakhstan-EU economic roundtable in Brussels, attended by Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev. A framework agreement between the Mangystau region and Damen Shipyards Group was signed during the event. Under the agreement, a new shipyard will be built in Kazakhstan’s sector of the Caspian Sea with a total investment of approximately €100 million.

Authorities are hopeful that the project will enhance the region’s industrial potential, expand its transport and logistics capabilities, and strengthen cooperation among the countries bordering the Caspian Sea. The project is also expected to introduce new technologies and create skilled jobs.

Damen Shipyards Group is the largest shipbuilding group in the Netherlands, established in 1927. Since then, the Gorinchem-based company has built tugboats, patrol vessels, ferries, cargo vessels, dredgers, naval vessels and other marine equipment.

Earlier this year, Kazakhstan also signed two major international contracts with companies in Azerbaijan and China to construct six dry cargo vessels. The total value of the contracts exceeds $100 million.

Furthermore, in 2024, the country’s government said it would sell an 85% stake in the Ural Plant Zenit, a Kazakhstan-owned shipbuilding yard in Uralsk, to modernize the facility.

Meanwhile, KazMunayGas, Kazakhstan’s national oil company, was exploring the possibility of building a shipyard on the Caspian coast, as Yerbolat Mendybayev, head of the company’s transportation and logistics division, revealed in 2024.