Official rates of banking metals from national bank as of December 02
One troy ounce=31.10 grams
A delegation led by the naval attaché at the United States Embassy in Ukraine Peter Mallory has arrived in Odesa, the Ukrainian Defense Ministry reports.
According to a report on the department’s website, the naval attaché visited the main base of the Ukrainian Naval Forces, where he held a number of bilateral meetings with representatives of the command of the Ukrainian Navy. The parties discussed areas of bilateral military cooperation.
“We have extensive experience of long-term cooperation with our partners, we have cooperation in terms of both training our ship crews, command and control bodies, and manning and enhancing the capabilities of the Navy at sea. Today was dedicated to cooperation in different directions – this is the training of personnel, and the replenishment of the naval personnel,” said commander of the Ukrainian Armed Forces’ Navy Oleksiy Neizhpapa after the meeting.
According to him, the issue of security in the Black and Azov Seas was also discussed.
“This cooperation is very useful and necessary for the Ukrainian Navy,” he said.
DELEGATION, NAVAL ATTACHÉ, ODESA, UNITED STATES EMBASSY, VISIT
The European Commission awaits a final decision on the dispute between Ukraine and the EU on a temporary ban on export of round timber until the end of this year, as follows from the EU’s annual Association Implementation Report.
“Recent draft legal proposals which would introduce local content requirements in public procurement procedures are a cause of concern as they breach the equal treatment and non-discrimination principles of public procurement under the AA, the WTO and the WTO Agreement on Government Procurement,” the report says.
“Regarding trade defense activities, the recent proliferation of safeguard investigations launched by Ukraine have not always been carried out in strict adherence with criteria and standards,” according to the document.
“Following many years of uninterrupted growth favored by the Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area (DCFTA) established by the AA, bilateral trade in the first eight months of 2020 compared to the same period in 2019 decreased by around 11% as a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic. The EU remains by far Ukraine’s biggest trading partner. Regarding Ukraine’s wood export ban, a longstanding bilateral trade-irritant, a bilateral arbitration panel under the AA has been established and a final ruling of the panel is expected still in 2020,” the EC said.
“With regard to the reform of the Ukrainian forest-based sector, including wood harvesting and trade and, in particular, wood legality, Ukraine authorities from the Ministry of Environment Protection and Natural Resources committed during a TSD (Trade and Sustainable Development) sub-committee meeting in October 2020, to the need for a separation of functions between the management of resources and control functions and thus a reorganization and distribution of responsibilities between control and inspection on the one hand, and wood harvesting and trade on the other,” the report states.
The Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine (AMCU) has begun collecting information and studying the electric car charging market, the committee said on its website.
It notes the intensive growth of the electric car market in recent years, while the market for commercial charging stations is also growing. In this regard, the AMCU starts monitoring it in order to control compliance with the legislation on the protection of economic competition.
“The purpose of this control is to determine the state of the competitive environment in the market and its assessment; to identify and determine the problems in the market that hinder the development of competition; to ensure compliance with legislation on the protection of economic competition; to prepare, if necessary, based on the results of such control, proposals for the implementation of measures aimed to develop competition,” the committee notes.
The AMCU called on current and potential market participants to provide information and considerations on possible economic, organizational, administrative and technical barriers that may prevent new companies from competing in the electric vehicle charging market.
As reported, Minister of Infrastructure Vladyslav Krykliy said in November 2020 that Ukraine supports the use of ecological modes of transport in cities, therefore, as part of the National Transport Strategy until 2030, it plans to completely replace all urban public transport with electric one and create the appropriate infrastructure for this.
The competition for the election of the head of the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) may begin in December this year, and taking into account the possible lockdown, it will be completed by spring 2021, Acting Head of the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) Maksym Hryschuk has said.
In an exclusive interview with the Interfax-Ukraine agency, Hryschuk said that the competition committee had already held a number of meetings. “When they decide on the regulations, they will announce the start of the competition. Perhaps it will be in December,” he said.
Answering the question on whether he will take part in the competition, Hryschuk said: “I still want to keep an intrigue. The competition has not yet been officially announced, so it is unethical to talk about participation in it.”
Speaking about when we can expect a new head of the SAPO, elected at the competition, he said that it takes time to submit documents and conduct three stages of the competition, and the situation with the epidemic should also be taken into account.
“I think it will be around January-February. And if a lockdown is introduced now, it may still drag on,” he said.
The full text of the interview will be published on the Interfax-Ukraine website in the public domain.
TK-Domashniy Tekstyl (TK-Home Textile), an operator in production and sale of home textiles in the structure of the trade and production group Textile-Contact, has signed the first significant contract for the supply of products to Lithuania for EUR 200,000, owner of Textile-Contact Oleksandr Sokolovsky said.
“The decrease in demand in the domestic market forces us to look for new sales channels for our products. Therefore, I am glad that TK-Domashniy Tekstyl has confidently started to enter the European market. If previously there were only small supplies to Poland and other countries, now the first serious contract has been signed with Lithuania,” Sokolovsky told Interfax-Ukraine on Monday.
He said that the first batch of mattresses, pillows and blankets has already been shipped for a large wholesale company from Lithuania, which works closely with both Lithuanian government agencies and leading hotels and restaurants. In the first half of 2021, it is planned to complete the entire delivery and conclude a new contract for a large amount.
Sokolovsky said that the implementation of such a contract became possible thanks to the receipt of the Oeko-Tex Standard 100 European quality certificate by a textile factory in Chernihiv (TK-DT Chernihiv).
Oeko-Tex Standard is an international system for testing and certification of products made of textile materials, which sets restrictions on the use of certain chemicals, it is recognizable by the buyer and serves as an additional confirmation of the quality of products for manufacturers.
According to Sokolovsky, another factor that contributed to the conclusion of the contract was the receipt of the EUR1 certificate, confirming the Ukrainian origin of the goods and exempting the buyer from import duties.
Sokolovsky said that such a certificate can only be obtained if Ukrainian raw materials were used in the manufacture of products, which was fully consistent with Textile-Contact.
According to him, more than 50 jobs were involved in the implementation of the contract, and in total 430 people work at TK-Domashniy Tekstyl (including three production factories in Chernihiv, Kyiv and Odesa).
“TK-Domashniy Tekstyl company is actively negotiating to start cooperation with representatives of other European countries. The pilot delivery of textile products of its own production to Lithuania served as a serious impetus in this direction,” Sokolovsky said.
