Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev said Kazakhstan would begin saving money and sequestering the budget amid the "complicated situation" the country's neighbors face.

"Despite all the difficulties, we reached an economic growth of 4.3% in 2014. I think this is a good result, given the existing situation. We need to monitor the situation in Russia and Europe. The problems in the neighboring countries, such as a fall in personal income and higher social tension, may affect our country as well. We have to prevent it," Nazarbayev is quoted by the government's press service as saying.

The president said that Kazakhstan had all necessary resources to respond to problems. As revenues to the national budget have dropped sharply, the government will have to revise it, the president said.

"We revised the budget earlier. We will do it again, if necessary. We need to clearly let all Kazakhstanis know that we are cutting down on our expenses. Over the course of our years of independence, we have built over 700 schools and about the same number of hospitals. We need to complete the ongoing projects but suspend new construction projects, including some investment projects. Such projects will be resumed after the crisis is over," Nazarbayev said.

The exchange rate on January 15 was 183.55 tenge/$1.