After the heating season had completed, Ukraine increased natural gas reserves in its underground storage facilities (UGS) by 2.971 billion cubic meters, according to data from PJSC Ukrtransgaz. Thus, from April 8 to June 16 gas reserves in storage facilities had grown by 40%, to 10.406 billion cubic meters from 7.435 billion cubic meters.
According to the calculations of Interfax-Ukraine, on June 1-16 gas stocks rose by 841.21 million cubic meters (52.58 million cubic meters per day), in May by 1.632 billion cubic meters (52.65 million cubic meters per day), April 9-30 by 500.84 million cubic meters (22.77 million cubic meters per day).
If the existing volumes of imports and current domestic production are preserved, in July the country have about 11.2 billion cubic meters of reserves in storage facilities.
Ukrtransgaz, 100% owned by Naftogaz Ukrainy, operates the system of trunk gas pipelines and 12 underground gas storage facilities of the country with a total capacity of 31 billion cubic meters.
Deputy Chairman of Kyiv City State Administration (KCSA) Dmytro Davtian on June 18 discussed the possibility of mutual partnership with a delegation from Shanghai led by Vice Mayor Xu Kunlin, the administration’s press service has reported.
The parties agreed to expand and deepen mutual cooperation not only in the infrastructure and transport spheres, but also in tourism and IT industry.
“I consider China as a whole and Shanghai in particular as extremely important strategic partners for Kyiv. I am convinced that we should develop not only infrastructure and road areas that we have already outlined as promising. I’ve been in China twice in the past few months and I understand that the country is worthy of contacts as a technological leader and as a tourist destination. There are many areas. Shanghai’s development figures are impressive, and we would like to not just learn from experience – we prefer to be full partners with interesting investment projects,” Davtian said.
According to him, Kyiv has serious prospects for development, especially, “if we choose for orientation the cities that are developing in a reasonable and planned manner.”
“Shanghai is not only ready to sign official documents with Kyiv. Guests from China want a really warm partnership, and we support it, we are determined to be mutually beneficial,” Davtian said.
KCSA is planning a working visit of Ukrainian officials to Shanghai, as well as Ukraine’s participation in the first China International Import Expo, which is to be held in Shanghai in November.
Some 128 countries have already confirmed their participation in the exhibition, the guests said.
The grain harvest forecast in Ukraine remains at the level of 2017 – 60 million tonnes and more, despite that some regions in the south and east of the country have no rains, Ukraine’s Agricultural Policy and Food Ministry has reported. According to the report, since early April there were cases of drought in Ukraine, although rains in June stabilized the situation and brought most of the regions from the risk zone. “Rains have started and we expect that in general, gross early and late grain crop harvest will be at the level of the last year,” First Deputy Minister Maksym Martyniuk said.
He said that good hibernation of winter crops and moisture stock positively influenced the start of the harvesting campaign, and no plunge in the yield is expected.
As reported, Ukraine as of June 18, 2019 harvested first 10,500 tonnes of winter wheat.
The Supreme Court of Ukraine has confirmed the necessity of paying a UAH 431 million fine by the largest cigarette distributor Tedis Ukraine (earlier Megapolis-Ukraine) imposed by the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine, Committee Head Yuriy Terentiev has said.
“The Supreme Court has decided in favor of the Antimonopoly Committee in a long lawsuit concerning Tedis, the distributor of cigarettes. The decision of the committee dated December 16, 2016 was retained with the exception of a little clarification regarding the way of fulfilling the obligation to establish a transparent pricing mechanism,” he wrote on his Facebook page on Tuesday.
As reported, the committee at the end of 2016 imposed a fine of UAH 431 million on Tedis Ukraine for abuse of the monopoly position on the market, but the company appealed against this decision in court.
Ukraine’s gross foreign debt amounted to $116.29 billion as of early April 2018, which was 0.25% or $288 million less than at the beginning of the year, the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) reported on its website on Tuesday. According to the central bank, government debt in Q1 2018 increased by 0.39%, to $39.153 billion, NBU liabilities decreased by 0.47%, to $7.403 billion. Government debt and NBU liabilities are represented exclusively by long-term borrowings.
The liabilities of deposit corporations in the reporting period increased by 0.8%, to $6.236 billion, other sectors decreased by 1.11%, to $53.861 billion and debt on direct investments grew by 0.37%, to $9.587 billion.
The lion’s share of gross external debt is denominated in U.S. dollars – 70.9%. Another 13% are liabilities in euros and 11.8% in SDR (special drawing rights). The National Bank also said that net gross external assets as of early April 2018 amounted to $5.032 billion, whereas as of late 2017 the net gross external debt was $4.111 billion.
As reported, the aggregate state (direct) and state-guaranteed debt of Ukraine in April 2018 decreased by 0.41%, or by $320 million, to $77.05 billion. In the national currency, the national debt declined by 1.59%, or by UAH 32.62 billion, to UAH 2.021 trillion. Since the beginning of the year, the aggregate state (direct) and state-guaranteed debt in U.S. dollar terms increased by 0.97%, or by $740 million, in the hryvnia declined by 5.64%, or by UAH 120.7 billion.
Ukrainian IT talents have received another important argument in favor of the industry development in the country. A new business campus of the UNIT.City Innovation Park with the Chasopys.UNIT co-working place has opened in Kyiv. Many incumbent and future residents of the innovative city – more than 500 people – gathered to celebrate a house-warming party on June 14. “Our main task is to help talented people grow and succeed in our country but not abroad, create big companies. This is a challenge to build not only a modern city but also a space for new opportunities for the development of a creative economy of the country,” founder of UFuture Investment Group and one of the major investors in the project Vasyl Khmelnytsky said.
The building with an area of 3,800 square meters is designed for 360 people to work comfortably at once. The project of the new building was created by the Odesa architectural studio Haliulin Architects. The campus has the shape of a cube, while three types of glass were used in construction. “If to walk along the building, it seems to be hovering in the air, going up and down along the axis,” CEO and Managing Partner of UNIT.City Max Yakover said.
Some 50 well-known companies have entered or selected offices in the new campus, including SolarGaps, a Ukrainian startup in the field of alternative energy, the Quadrate28 marketing agency, ARbrowser, LookinAR, and Crosslytics.
“The first residents of the new co-working space became the following companies: Imperious Group, Royenko Agency, Hubble Ukraine, the DTEK design team, the Quadrate28 representative office and others,” UNIT.City Managing Partner Maksym Bakhmatov stated. The Fedoriv creative agency plans to become a resident of UNIT.City. Andriy Fedoriv is seeking a location in the innovative city building being under construction, the opening of which is scheduled for this year.
“Chasopys.UNIT is the fourth co-working place of the Chasopys network,” CEO of Chasopys Creative Family Aliona Kalibaba said. According to her, the best practices achieved in the last six years were united in the design of the building. “The campus events calendar is being filled in. Schools of entrepreneurship, international competitions and a form of expert Fridays will be held here,” Kalibaba added.
