The agency said the figures, presented at a regular Kazakh government meeting, showed 730 enterprises were either totally or partially idle. A further 163 firms were on short-time working, the worst record for over two years.
It said companies owed some 436 million tenge ($10.4 million) to the state and another 5 billion tenge to banks.
Monetary policy had not been tight enough to stabilize the tenge, introduced late last year, and the currency had fallen steadily against both the dollar and the ruble, Itar-Tass said.
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