Prices for construction and assembly work in Ukraine in May 2021 increased by 16.8% compared to May 2020, the State Statistics Service has reported.
According to the statistics department, prices increased in all segments of construction: in residential construction the growth was 10.6%, in non-residential construction – 15.3%, in engineering – 22.1%.
Compared to the previous month, the cost of construction of residential buildings in May increased by 1.3%, non-residential – by 2%, engineering structures – by 1.4%.
Since the beginning of the year, the rise in prices for construction work amounted to 14.2%, the State Statistics Service said.
As reported, in 2020, prices for construction work increased by 3.7% compared to the previous year, while in 2019 – by 6%.
The Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food is negotiating with companies from Israel, the United States, France and China regarding public-private partnership in the reconstruction of irrigation systems in the southern regions of Ukraine, Minister Roman Leshchenko said in an exclusive interview with Interfax-Ukraine.
“These are projects with main canals, pumping stations, systems for the sale of both drinking and irrigation water. Now we are negotiating with companies from Israel, the United States, France and China in terms of such a public-private partnership,” he said.
According to Leshchenko, Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal, during a meeting on the state of irrigation of lands with representatives of relevant ministries on June 9, instructed to prepare relevant projects on reclamation systems.
“The logic of the prime minister is that, given the uniqueness of our irrigation system, we need to scale the corresponding project through the prism of the expertise of world-renowned companies that can offer integrated solutions for both drip irrigation and the use of sprinkler machines, the use of main canals, and also the latest technologies of an intelligent water supply system,” the minister said.
He said that the Ministry of Agrarian Policy is currently negotiating with world leaders in irrigation, but cannot disclose their details yet.
As the minister said, there is an interest in companies with experience and the possibility of expertise in the implementation of large reclamation projects.
The Board of Directors of Ferrexpo with assets in Ukraine has approved the early repayment of its outstanding pre-export finance facility (PXF facility) the agreement on which was signed in 2018. As at December 31, 2020, the group had $257 million of debt drawn on its PXF facility.
The company said on Wednesday that repayment is to take place today, while earlier repayment was scheduled to take place quarterly between 2020 and 2022.
Early repayment of this facility reflects the strong performance of the group’s operations, including recent growth in both the group’s production volumes and product quality, following the recent completion of investments throughout the group’s operations, representing prudent cash management practice.
The total wage arrears in Ukraine in May of this year fell by 6.1%, and as of June 1, 2021 amounted to UAH 3.351 billion, and since early 2021 they grew by 28.3%, the State Statistics Service said last week.
According to the service, the amount of wage arrears at enterprises that stopped filing reports during 2019-2020 amounted to UAH 166.1 million on the same date.
As reported by the statistics authority, a reduction in wage arrears in May 2021 was recorded in Luhansk (by 73.7%), Volyn (by 49%), Lviv (by 21.7%), Donetsk (by 17.5%), Kirovohrad (by 9.5%) and Chernihiv (by 2.9%) regions.
At the same time, an increase in wage arrears was seen in Khmelnytska (by 36.8%), Zakarpattia (by 19.8%), Cherkaska (by 14.5%), Kherson (by 12.7%), Zaporizhia (by 12.6%), Ivano-Frankivsk (by 11.7%), Vinnytsia (11.3%), Zhytomyr (10.5%), Rivne (8.3%), Dnipropetrovsk (7.4%), Kyiv and Ternopil (6.4%) %), Odesa (5.2%) regions and Kyiv city (0.7%).
The State Statistics Service said that among economic sectors in May 2021, wage arrears grew in in the field of administrative and support services – by 21.9% (to UAH 17.93 million), financial and insurance activities – by 20% (to UAH 0.23 million), agriculture – by12.9% (to UAH 74.52 million), in real estate transactions – by 12.5% (to UAH 41.04 million), education – by 12.5% (to UAH 20.59 million), in wholesale and retail trade – by 11% (to UAH 40.26 million), professional, scientific and technical activities – by 7% (to UAH 274.27 million), at transport, warehouse and courier enterprises – by 4.8% (to UAH 193.72 million), in the field of informatization and telecommunications – by 4.2% (to UAH 15.91 million), and construction – by 2.4% (to UAH 84.14 million).
At the same time, in the field of art, sports, entertainment and recreation, wage arrears decreased 10% (to UAH 1.74 million), in industry – 9.6% (to UAH 2.506 billion), in the field of temporary accommodation and catering 7.7% (to UAH 1.89 million), healthcare – 3.7% (to UAH 69.72 million), public administration, defense and compulsory social insurance – 2.3% (to UAH 5.38 million).
The Ukrainian national football team beat the Swedish national football team with a score of 2:1, reaching quarter-finals of the European Football Championship 2020.
The Ukrainian national football team beat the Swedish national football team with a score of 2:1 and advanced to quarter-finals of the European Football Championship, where it will play against the England national football team, which beat Germany on Tuesday. The match will take place in Rome.
The Ukraine-Sweden match took place on Tuesday June 29 in Glasgow, Scotland.
The Ukrainians opened the scoring in the 27th minute. Oleksandr Zinchenko scored on a pass of Andriy Yarmolenko. In the 43rd minute, Emil Forsberg equalized the score.
The winning goal was scored by Artem Dovbyk, it was his first goal for the national team a few minutes before the end of extra time.
CHAMPIONSHIP, EUROPEAN FOOTBALL, FOOTBALL, QUARTER-FINALS, SWEDEN
A number of enterprises representing the dairy industry are preparing a statement for consideration by the Interdepartmental Commission on International Trade to ban the import of dairy products from Belarus to Ukraine, since the embargo it introduced in 2016 on Ukrainian dairy products is a discriminatory and unfriendly action.
This was announced by Head of the Union of Dairy Enterprises of Ukraine Vadym Chaharovsky to Interfax-Ukraine on Tuesday.
“We believe that in this case it is necessary to apply Article 29 of the law on foreign economic activity on protection from unfriendly actions of states or economic groups. We believe that the Republic of Belarus took such discriminatory unfriendly actions against Ukraine,” he said.
Chaharovsky said that in 2015, Belarus supported the Russian embargo on the import of Ukrainian dairy products, which came into effect on January 1, 2016. At the same time, the Ukrainian market is currently open for the products of 14 milk processing enterprises from Belarus.
According to Article 29 of the law on foreign economic activity, in response to discriminatory and/or unfriendly actions of other states, customs unions or economic groups, Ukraine may apply a full or partial ban on trade; deprivation of most favored nation or preferential special treatment; introduction of special duties; introduction of a licensing regime for foreign economic operations; establishment of quotas.
The head of the union said that the Ministry of Economy refused to conduct a special investigation of the growing imports of dairy products to Ukraine, an application for which was submitted in February 2021 by a group of 14 enterprises representing the dairy industry. He said that the enterprises are going to submit a repeated application within the next 10 days.
