President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky signed decree No.635/2021 appointing Viktor Mykyta as head of Zakarpattia Regional State Administration.
According to the press service of the President’s Office, during a meeting, Zelensky introduced the new head of Zakarpattia Regional State Administration with an official certificate and expressed his conviction that his experience and knowledge would contribute to effective work in the position.
On Sunday, December 12, two new batches of CoronaVac vaccine against coronavirus infection (COVID-19) will be delivered to Ukraine, the press service of the pharmaceutical company Lekhim has said.
“The Lekhim Group of Companies informs that on Sunday, December 12, 2021, two deliveries of CoronaVac vaccine for the prevention of COVID-19 [produced by Sinovac Life Science Co., Ltd.] will arrive in Ukraine,” the company’s website says.
It is noted that 2.447 million doses will arrive on Sunday.
“Estimated time of arrival is 12:00 – 2 million doses, and 19:20 – 447,000 doses,” the press service added.
It is also reported that the supply of the vaccine is carried out under a supplementary agreement to the agreement between Sinovac Life Science Co., Ltd. and PrJSC Lekhim.
The public organization Association of Gardeners, Grape Growers and Winemakers of Ukraine (Ukrsadvinprom) and the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food have begun work on the creation of a viticultural register to record the production and consumption of grapes and wine in Ukraine, which will allow to cancel the licensing of wine and remove it from the list of excisable goods.
This was announced by Head of the public organization Volodymyr Pechko at a press conference at Interfax-Ukraine on Friday.
Ukrsadvinprom and the Ministry of Agrarian Policy begin to work on the creation of a viticultural register, which is necessary for the correct regulation of the market, namely, on the creation of three types of obligatory declarations: how many grapes you produced, how much wine you made from these grapes, and how much wine you have left at the end of the year,” Pechko said.
According to him, the state with the help of these three declarations will be able to effectively analyze the production, sales volumes and carryover stocks of grapes and wine in the country, which in the future will allow it to abandon the need to license wine and abolish the excise tax from it.
He added that, according to Ukrainian law, wine is a food product that should not be subject to excise tax.
“I believe that this will lead to an increase in the number of wineries. We are working to ensure that such ‘chateau’ [wineries] are created in Ukraine. These do not have to be giant enterprises,” Pechko said.
In addition, Ukrsadvinprom intends in 2022 to join the OIV (International Organization of Vine and Wine), which controls 85% of the world wine market.
“We are planning to enter the international organization OIV. This is an organization for wine, which includes 47 states. It is 85% of the world wine market, which is created by the leading countries: China, France, Spain, the United States – and which everyone is striving to join. It is engaged in the harmonization of accepted standards for the production of wine products,” Pechko said.
According to him, this initiative is also supported by the Ministry of Agrarian Policy. The head of the organization said that the issue of joining the OIV is only how much time is needed to complete the association procedure. He admitted that it will be possible to do this next year.
Interfax-Ukraine and the Experts Club acted as partners of Odessa Wine Week.
AGRARIAN MINISTRY WANT, EXCISABLE GOODS, EXPERTS CLUB, KHANAMERYAN, ODESSA WINE WEEK, UKRSADVINPROM, URAKIN, WINE, ВИШТАК, ПЕЧКО, ТКАЧЕНКО
Producers and processors of grapes, as well as representatives of the wine industry will hold the international forum Odessa Wine Week in Odesa on May 25-29, the event will unite the efforts of the Ukrainian wine-making community aimed at developing the Ukrainian wine market, wine and gastronomic tourism, popularizing and promoting the Ukrainian Wine brand and the integration of Ukraine into the world wine community.
This was announced by the organizers of the event – head of the Ukrsadvinprom public organization Volodymyr Pechko, head of the Expo-Yug-Service projects Bella Khanameryan and head of the wine technology and sensory analysis department of the Odesa National Academy of Food Technologies Oksana Tkachenko at a press conference at Interfax- Ukraine.
According to Ukrsadvinprom head Pechko, his association organizes an annual forum, which was first held this year in Odesa, since this site allows to gather the leading experts of the wine industry, scientists, oenologists (experts in evaluating vineyards), winemakers, government officials, national and foreign wine associations, tourism industry, HoReCa and retail, sommeliers, journalists, wine traders and producers of related products and technologies to popularize Ukrainian wines.
“Last year, one could taste 305 samples from 65 wineries in Ukraine. That is, in one place you can taste Ukrainian wines: craft winemakers, medium-sized producers with vineyards of 40-60 hectares, and large producers from all over Ukraine,” Pechko said.
The organizer of the forum, Bella Khanameryan, specified that this year 30 companies have become partners of the event. In addition, 87 speakers and experts from 18 countries spoke at Odessa Wine Week 2021, profile reports and discussions were held on 40 topics, over 3,000 people attended the event.
According to her, in 2022, projects were announced at the forum, including talks about wine and Ukraine’s integration into the world wine community Wine Future Forum, as well as the Odessa Wine & Spirit Awards competition.
“In 2022 we will have a creative competition for the best label. We will have a sailing regatta, a special program “Women in Winemaking,” evening performances, musical and artistic performances, exhibitions, biennials, everything that can be shown in the culture of drinking, pay attention to wine as part of the cultural code of the country,” Khanameryan explained.
According to Oksana Tkachenko, Ukrainian industry representatives see recognition in other countries of the world among their strategic goals.
“We already see interest from our closest neighbors, we are waiting for delegations from such countries such as Uzbekistan, Georgia, Armenia, who will not only come to show themselves, but we are preparing educational projects for them, within which they will visit wineries and participate in educational project in B2B and B2C formats,” she said.
Ihor Vishtak, the director of the agrarian development department of the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine, who participated in the press conference, said that his department has already allocated UAH 450 million of compensation to support horticulture, viticulture and hop-growing in 2021, of which UAH 200 million for planting material, the construction of trellises for growing climbing plants and drip irrigation (of which – UAH 9 million for viticulture), and UAH 250 million – for the construction and reconstruction of facilities for these crops (including UAH 19 million – for the construction of facilities and the purchase of wine-making lines).
Interfax-Ukraine and the Experts Club acted as partners of Odessa Wine Week.
CONFERENCE, EXPERTS CLUB, KHANAMERYAN, ODESSA WINE WEEK, URAKIN, WINE, ВИШТАК, ПЕЧКО, ТКАЧЕНКО
Founder of the Autostrada Group of Companies Maksym Shkil has said that the Group does not currently experience a shortage of bitumen, however, in his opinion, the country needs to have its own production.
“We do not feel a deficit in the company. We always have stocks for five-ten days, which are located on the territory of Ukraine. But in general, in order to diversify completely, we should do several things in the country. Strategically – we need to have our own bitumen production, as well as production of high-quality petroleum products. Ukraine cannot but have this,” he said in an exclusive interview with Interfax-Ukraine.
Maksym Shkil noted that for this there must be an appropriate state policy.
“If we take today, situationally, we must have the capacity for handling petroleum products in ports. Not exporting something, but accepting it. This issue, I think, should be enhanced so that Ukrainian ports can provide the Ukrainian market,” he said.
The share of chain tenants in tenant-mix shopping and entertainment centers of the Dragon Capital investment company increased due to a decrease in the share of non-systemic tenants, a trend noted by Tomas Fiala, founder and CEO of Dragon Capital, which actively invests in real estate.
“We get our rental income more as percentage of turnover. The base rental rate during COVID-19 has become significantly lower, and percentage of turnover – higher. Therefore, we are more attached to the success of our tenants and are interested in their profitability. It happened so that the share of non-systemic tenants – private entrepreneurs who supply goods non-systematically – decreased, while the share of chain tenants increased,” he said in an exclusive interview with Interfax-Ukraine.
According to the head of Dragon Capital, the company monitors the real turnover of tenants, which is one of the terms of the lease.
According to Fiala, the share of electronics stores in the tenant pool has increased, sales of which have grown significantly during the pandemic.
According to him, in shopping centers there is still no trend towards a reduction in retail space due to an increase in the share of online trading.
“We already have good traffic in some shopping centers. Although even with a decrease in the number of customers amid COVID-19 [last summer, the attendance in malls was 20-25% lower], on more rare visits, they bought more, made larger purchases, so the turnover recovered,” Fiala said.
Speaking about investments in shopping mall projects, the head of Dragon Capital noted that large shopping centers are a risky investment, and the company prefers small projects.
“We prefer such small malls as Piramida or Aladdin, located in a densely populated residential area near the subway. But such objects also require attention, they need to be dealt with, they need to be modernized, adjusted to the needs of customers,” he said.
Fiala, in particular, specified that the company had invested about $9 million in the construction of a gallery expansion and completion of an office center of Piramida mall.
The head of the investment company added that Dragon Capital was also considering the acquisition of Dream Town mall.
“We considered Dream Town. Ocean Plaza is also kind of for sale. But in such huge malls there should be a very interesting price, because they will work for the next five years, but with the development of e-commerce, the tenant-mix will also change there. There will be more entertainment and dining, less commerce, as it has been in America for the past five years. So far it is not very visible, but sooner or later it will also start to happen in Ukraine,” Fiala summed up.
