Kazakhstan is a vast country in Central Asia, the largest landlocked nation in the world and the ninth largest by area overall, stretching across the great Eurasian steppe from the Caspian Sea toward the mountains of China. A land of open grasslands, deserts, and peaks, it was for millennia the realm of nomadic horse peoples. Rich in oil, gas, and minerals, it is today the dominant economy of Central Asia.
The steppes of Kazakhstan were home to nomadic horse cultures for thousands of years, from the ancient Scythians to the Turkic and Mongol peoples who swept across Eurasia. From these emerged the Kazakhs, who formed a khanate in the fifteenth century. From the eighteenth century the Russian Empire gradually absorbed the region, and under the Soviet Union it became a republic that saw mass settlement, vast farming projects, a major space programme, and, more darkly, nuclear weapons testing, before independence came in 1991.
Kazakhstan is dominated by the steppe, a seemingly endless expanse of grassland and semi-desert that covers much of the country, giving way to true desert in the south and high mountains in the southeast along the borders with China and Kyrgyzstan. Far from any ocean, it has a harsh continental climate of bitterly cold winters and hot summers. The shrinking of the Aral Sea, drained by Soviet irrigation, stands as one of the world's worst environmental disasters.
The flag of Kazakhstan is sky blue, bearing a golden sun with rays above a soaring golden steppe eagle, with a vertical band of national ornamental pattern at the hoist. The blue represents the wide sky and has long been a sacred colour to the Turkic peoples, symbolising unity, while the sun stands for life and the eagle for freedom and the soaring aspirations of the nation. The design is rich with the symbolism of the steppe.
The majority of Kazakhs are Muslims, following the Sunni tradition, a faith that spread across the steppe over centuries, though often blended with older nomadic customs. The country is also home to a large Russian Orthodox Christian community, a legacy of Russian and Soviet settlement, along with other faiths. Decades of Soviet atheism left a strongly secular character, and Kazakhstan is known for a generally easygoing religious coexistence.
Kazakh cuisine reflects the nomadic, pastoral roots of the people, centred on meat and dairy. The national dish is beshbarmak, boiled meat, traditionally horse or mutton, served over flat noodles, eaten communally. Horse meat and milk products feature prominently, including kumis, fermented mare's milk, a traditional drink. Hearty, warming food suited to a harsh climate and a culture of hospitality remains at the heart of the Kazakh table.
Kazakhstan's huge expanse of steppe makes it a major agricultural producer, above all of grain. It is one of the world's significant exporters of wheat, grown across the northern plains, much of it on land brought under the plough during a massive Soviet campaign. Livestock herding, the traditional way of life, remains important, with large numbers of sheep, cattle, and horses. The country's farmland is vast, though much of it is dry and marginal.
The nomadic empires of the steppe, and the rise of the Kazakh Khanate, shaped the nation's identity. Under Soviet rule the territory became the site of the Baikonur Cosmodrome, from which the first satellite and the first human were launched into space, and also of extensive nuclear weapons testing that harmed the land and its people. Independence in 1991 made Kazakhstan a sovereign nation that has since built considerable wealth on its natural resources.
Kazakhstan has a population of around 20 million people spread thinly across its enormous territory, making it one of the most sparsely populated countries on Earth. Ethnic Kazakhs are the majority, alongside a large Russian minority and many other groups, a diversity inherited from the Soviet era. The society is increasingly urban, centred on the largest city, Almaty, and the purpose-built capital, Astana, raised on the northern steppe.
