The Almaty Air Initiative (AAI) has submitted an analytical report containing a package of recommendations for reducing air pollution in Kazakhstan’s largest city to the Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources of the Republic of Kazakhstan and the Almaty City Administration. The report draws on the experience of Beijing, which has achieved one of the world’s most significant improvements in air quality over the past decade.

The report is the result of an international expert workshop organized by AAI in late April 2026 with the support of the Almaty Development Center and the participation of the Chinese Research Academy of Environmental Sciences (CRAES), China’s leading state research institution specializing in environmental protection and air quality.

During the workshop, experts presented the systematic approach taken by Beijing and other Chinese cities to combat smog, ranging from reforms in the energy and transport sectors to the development of modern air quality monitoring, emissions control, and air quality management systems. For the first time, this experience has been adapted to the specific conditions of Almaty.

Zhuldyz Saulebekova, Executive Director of the Almaty Air Initiative:

“Today, Almaty is roughly at the point where Beijing was ten years ago. China’s experience shows that air pollution is not an ‘inevitable’ problem of a growing metropolis, but a challenge that can be effectively managed. Systemic change becomes possible when air quality is made a government priority and when authorities, science, technology, and society work together. Our report provides a ready-to-use analytical foundation that can support the development of both municipal and national air quality policies”.

What China Achieved Over a Decade

Key results of China’s national air pollution control program include:

  • transitioning approximately 39 million households from coal heating to cleaner energy sources;
  • phasing out approximately 80 million tonnes of coal;
  • upgrading 98% of coal-fired power plants to ultra-low emission standards;
  • removing more than 30 million older, high-emission vehicles from the roads;
  • reducing the sulfur content of diesel fuel 200-fold, from 2,000 to 10 ppm;
  • creating the world’s largest air pollution monitoring system, integrating satellites, ground-based monitoring stations, and digital emissions monitoring.

The key lesson from China lies not in individual technologies, but in the overall governance architecture: data, science, public policy, enforcement, and public demand operate as a single integrated system.

What This Means for Almaty

China’s experience is particularly relevant to Almaty. Like many Chinese cities, the metropolis faces a combination of several factors at once: coal-fired power generation, household heating, a rapidly growing vehicle fleet, winter temperature inversions, and complex meteorological conditions.

Almaty Air Initiative experts emphasize that the goal is not to directly replicate the Chinese model, but rather to adopt its key principles:

  • regular inventories of pollution sources;
  • interagency coordination;
  • development of the air quality monitoring system;
  • adaptive environmental policy and systematic
  • action addressing all emission sources simultaneously.

The report prepared by the Almaty Air Initiative provides a ready analytical foundation for further work to improve air quality. The document has been submitted to government authorities and is publicly available on the Foundation’s website: https://air.org.kz/research/opyt-kitaya-v-borbe-s-zagryazneniem-vozduha/