ALMATY -- Kazakhstan signed a standby funding agreement for 1995 with the International Monetary Fund on Thursday and will receive $300 million in IMF support as part of an international package worth $1 billion.


The agreement follows a similar deal last year by the energy-rich republic in which the IMF contributed $400 million as part of a $1.2 billion donor package.


IMF delegation leader Ishan Kapur said the deal was "the international community's way of expressing support for the policies of the government and the national bank."


The program will concentrate on strengthening Kazakhstan's economic performance, bringing down inflation and stimulating output by modernizing the industrial sector, Kapur added.


The deal is subject to approval by the IMF board.


"It's going to be a tough 12 months, but I am sufficiently impressed by the performance over the past six to nine months that ... the future holds very good results," he added.


Details of the 1995 economic program were not published, but earlier this year the government forecast that output would fall by 12 percent after a 25 percent slump in 1994.


The budget decreed by President Nursultan Nazarbayev plans a deficit of 3.5 percent of gross domestic product.