Bazar-Terek

Bazar-Terek ("market poplar"; Maitöbe on Soviet maps) is a village in the Karatau foothills, in the Karatau planning zone of the Autonomous Tribal Regions (ATR), where tracks from the winter pastures of the Kyzylkum Fringe meet the road to the Talas valley. Its population is about 1,050 (2022 estimate).^[1] Its Thursday market, held under a stand of old poplars, is the main local outlet for wool, fleeces, felt and live sheep, and buyers come from the Irad Special Economic Zone and, when the crossings are open, from southern Kazakhstan. Wool prices collapsed in the 1990s, and since 2009 a cooperative of women felt-makers in the village has sold shyrdak rugs to shops in Talas.^[2]

References

1. ^ United Nations Mission in Irad (2022). Settlements and Services in the Karatau Zone. Kara-Oi.
2. ^ Zhumabaeva, Cholpon (2016). Horses and Herders: The Pastoral Economy of the Talas Alatau, 1930–2010. Talas: Talas State University Press.