Orda Investigates Alabuga Start Program

On April 16, a Kazakhstani media outlet ran a promotional article titled “Alabuga Start Program: Kazakhstani Women Can Get a New Profession and Job.” 

Orda.kz has investigated.

What's Promised?

The ad employs language, such as “developing human capital,” “empowering youth,” and offering “career growth” opportunities for girls aged 16 to 22, particularly those who are recent high school or college graduates.

The pay is advertised at $860 per month, with living expenses allegedly as low as around $52.

For many young women in Kazakhstan, especially those from rural areas with limited opportunities, the offer may seem like a legitimate path to financial independence and social mobility.

A new opportunity is opening up for young women — to build a new career path within the company, enroll in a university, or stay to live in Russia, the promotional text reads. 

What Is "Alabuga"?

The Alabuga Special Economic Zone (SEZ) was established in Tatarstan in 2006. Before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the zone thrived: foreign companies established operations, international investors poured in, and generous tax incentives made Alabuga one of the most attractive economic zones in Europe.

The company's Alabuga Polytech, an in-house training program, prepared students for skilled technical jobs directly on-site.

The SEZ boasted high-level oversight — its CEO, Timur Shagivaleev, also a deputy in Tatarstan’s State Council, and its board of directors included the republic’s head (Rais), Rustam Minnikhanov.

Following the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, foreign investors began pulling out, new development stalled, and existing projects were left in limbo. Staffing became a serious problem, with men being drafted from the production floor straight into military service. 

To keep Alabuga alive, authorities pivoted toward fulfilling defense contracts. One such order: manufacturing kamikaze drones based on Iranian designs.

In 2023, The Washington Post reported that Alabuga had begun assembling Shahed drones, rebranded as “Geraniums.”

In Alabuga’s internal documents, the plant seems to have been presented as a motorboat production facility.

Another UAV assembly project launched in January 2023 was more transparent about its purpose, but still downplayed its military application. In that case, the drones were reportedly intended for firefighting, aerial photography, and agricultural use.

With a growing need for labor, Alabuga began shifting student trainees onto drone assembly lines. In 2023, the State Council of Tatarstan — where Shagivaleev holds a seat — even proposed legal changes to allow minors to work in “hazardous conditions.” 

By the end of 2023, the Alabuga SEZ had landed on the European Union’s sanctions list, and in 2024, it was added to the U.S. Treasury’s list of sanctioned entities.

Rercruitment

The independent Russian outlet Protokol has detailed the inner workings and corporate practices of the Alabuga SEZ in Tatarstan, including how young foreign women, particularly from Africa, have been actively recruited to work at its drone assembly plant.

Initially, Alabuga focused on recruiting Russian students to prevent a labor shortage at the facility.

Currently, around a thousand students are enrolled at Polytech. Several hundred of them are already assembling Shahed drones supplied by Iran. These are teenagers aged 15 to 17, who enrolled in college after finishing ninth grade. All available labour capacity is now being redirected toward the Shahed project,Protokol reported in 2023. 

The actual salaries for students assembling drones at Alabuga ranged from 30,000 to 40,000 rubles per month (approximately $420–$560).

Workers were required to sign non-disclosure agreements (NDAs), their phones were monitored, and leaving the program was difficult. Those who chose to exit early faced penalties, with fines starting at 170,000 rubles.

In less than three years, at least two students reportedly died by suicide. One such case, involving a 17-year-old, was reported in 2023 by Russia’s network of city news portals.

The SEZ’s only comment was that the student had been “experiencing a difficult life situation.”

Former students also spoke of questionable methods of "patriotic education."

They were forced into manual labor, made to participate in competitive team-building games, and punished for losing, sometimes by being "shot" with paintball guns or ordered to dig trenches in the rain. These practices reportedly took place even before the drone production lines were fully operational. Footage of such activities was shared by the regional outlet 116.ru in Tatarstan.

As the Protokol notes, following the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, Alabuga's management decided to address the personnel shortage by recruiting women from Africa.

In light of the new reality, Alabuga Polytech began enrolling students from developing countries. A campaign was organized to attract students, but it was not successful - people from Africa were not particularly willing to enroll in Alabuga voluntarily. Then they decided to attract them using the dating apps Tinder and Badoo,the Protokol reported. 

The scheme, reportedly devised by SEZ director Timur Shagivaleev himself, involved students using dating platforms to lure African women to Tatarstan under the pretense of work and opportunity. The approach worked: by 2022, the first group of African women — referred to internally in Alabuga’s slang as “mulattos” — arrived at the SEZ.

The young women were isolated from the rest of the students and recruited for the lowest-skilled work, including cleaning, unloading cargo, and other labor-intensive tasks. 

"All workers are divided into three types - "mulattos", "Tajiks" and the upper class, "specialists". By "mulattos" they mean those same African students," wrote Protokol.

In the first half of 2024 alone, Alabuga recruited 182 women from African countries. But that still wasn’t enough to meet the labor demands of the special economic zone. Under the “Alabuga Start” program, the recruitment drive has expanded to include young women from Central Asia.

Leaked internal documents reveal the scope of the plans: by 2025, Alabuga aims to increase the workforce at its drone assembly plant to 2,600. For comparison, in 2023, the workforce stood at just 900.

Opportunity?

A year ago, Factcheck.kg published a detailed investigation into how Kyrgyz women were being drawn into the same scheme.

Alabuga has even developed a so-called "career ladder" for Central Asian recruits. In the “service and hospitality” track, for example, women are hired first as cleaners. To move up to an administrative position — with a monthly salary of 75,000 rubles (around $915) — they’re required to work at the SEZ for at least a year and a half.

Kyrgyz media have documented harsh working conditions and strict, punishing schedules inside Alabuga, far removed from the glowing image presented in recruitment ads.

An Uzbek journalist, Louisa Atabaeva, decided to investigate the Alabuga Start program firsthand. After spotting an advertisement in the media, she applied for a job. She was offered a position at a "high-tech composite production facility" with a salary of 52,000 rubles.

When she asked for details about the nature of the work, the response was vague. Some women who had already started working at Alabuga told Luiza they were “treated with respect” — but soon after, they stopped responding to her messages.

Alabuga likely shifted its recruitment efforts toward Central Asia after a major international scandal erupted in October 2024. African women employed in the SEZ reached out to The Associated Press, revealing they had been misled into working at a combat drone production site.

Initially, under the Alabuga Start program, they were told they would be studying catering and hospitality.

Instead, the women described grueling work shifts under constant surveillance, unfulfilled promises about salaries, and exposure to harsh chemicals that caused skin damage.

They stated that the plant's primary focus was almost entirely on drone production and that working conditions were abusive. Many were reportedly assigned to hazardous tasks without protective equipment. Worse, housing, airfare, medical care, and even training costs were all deducted from their paychecks.

David Albright, founder of the Institute for Science and International Security, later published a report detailing how African women were being recruited for drone assembly at Alabuga.

According to him, participants in the Alabuga Start program are primarily involved in building drone fuselages —labor that requires minimal training. Albright noted that this recruitment drive appears to be a deliberate shift away from using underage Russian students for such tasks.

According to Albright's organization, more than 90 percent of the Start program personnel and about one-third of the Polytech students are estimated to work in drone production,Voice of America reported.

It is worth noting that in Africa, the same recruitment tactics were employed as in Central Asia — promises of education, career opportunities, and a better life, all of which quickly fell apart upon arrival.

Marketing Blitz 

In 2022, the Alabuga Special Economic Zone in Tatarstan launched an attention-grabbing marketing campaign in one of the world’s most iconic locations — Times Square in New York. Among the flashing neon lights, a large blue banner appeared, featuring white clouds, an airplane, and the slogan: “Time to Go Home.”

According to publicly available data, a single day of ad placement there can range from $5,000 to $50,000. 

Even if they paid the average price of $30,000 — that’s about 1.5 to 2 million rubles (over 15 million tenge at current exchange rates). But in return, they get massive free media exposure, which will more than pay for itself,marketing expert Ruslan Serazetdinov told Tatar-inform. 

Indeed, news of Alabuga's flashy billboard in New York’s Times Square quickly made headlines across various media platforms.

According to the independent Russian outlet Verstka, Alabuga has increased its profit 45 times in a year. 

Albatross, a company operating within the Alabuga Special Economic Zone and known for assembling Geran-2 drones (also known as Shahed-136), reported revenues of over 955 million rubles — a 61% increase from the previous year.

Net profit skyrocketed by 4,350%: from 9.7 million rubles in 2023 to nearly 430 million in 2024.

Initially, Alabuga spent significant sums advertising through Russian influencers but was reportedly underwhelmed by the results. So the strategy shifted: they launched a broader campaign, buying ad space in widely followed Telegram channels — including those outside of Russia.

By 2023, advertisements for "Alabuga Start" began flooding student forums in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan, particularly in groups focused on university admissions and exam preparation. These posts have since been removed, along with the YouTube videos and social media accounts associated with the program.

The campaign’s target audience was clear: young women from rural or small-town backgrounds, typically with limited education and modest family incomes.

Alabuga’s PR team even tried recruiting Kazakh bloggers to visit the SEZ and post positive content. Preference was given to regional, Kazakh-speaking influencers. Many agreed — likely unaware of what Alabuga truly was — but only one blogger accepted the offer at the proposed rate.

That blogger ultimately canceled the trip, although she still posted a promotional video on Instagram. It was later deleted.

Meanwhile, promotional content continued to circulate in student groups, and program brochures were distributed in colleges. Even celebrities popular with Gen Z, such as Russian singer Instasamka, were brought in to help promote “Alabuga Start.”

With university application season approaching, Alabuga’s advertising department is back in full swing. And it’s ramping up in unexpected ways — now promoting an entrance exam through a seemingly innocent game called Business Cats.

Social media is seeing a wave of posts featuring teenagers playing the game, which Alabuga Polytech created as a quirky admission test.

"To get in, all you need to do is raise healthy cats, sell them at a profit, become a successful market trader, and earn more than your competitors,” the college’s message reads.

According to one Facebook post shared by a school in Kyrgyzstan:

To enter Alabuga Polytech, the only thing that matters is passing the Business Cats simulation. Alabuga Polytech is a one-of-a-kind vocational training center with a capacity for 10,000 students a year. 

Original Author: Nikita Drobny, Alina Pak

Please refer to the original article for accuracy.