About 130 Ukrainian citizens want to return home from Afghanistan at the present time, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba has said.
“Now about 130 citizens want to return. We are developing safe exit routes. We do not abandon our people in trouble abroad and have already proved this many times. They also leave on their own. In a month, more than 30 citizens and their family members left Afghanistan on their own,” Kuleba wrote on his page on Twitter on Tuesday.
The Lviv Clinical Emergency Hospital has performed the first lung transplant in Ukraine.
According to the press center of the Lviv Clinical Emergency Hospital, the transplantation to 56-year-old Viktor was carried out on September 21, 2021. The donor was a 54-year-old man who died of a hemorrhagic stroke. The family of the deceased gave permission for organ harvesting.
Transplantation became possible thanks to the recent opening of the first transplant center in Ukraine, which was opened on the basis of the Lviv Emergency Clinical Hospital Center.
“It is very important that our Center is located in isolation. It has its own separate ventilation, separate wards only for transplanted patients. After all, such patients, as a rule, have low immune function,” head of the center Maksym Ovechko said.
TOP 20 COUNTRIES UKRAINE HAS POSTED THE HIGHEST SURPLUS OF TRADE IN JAN-JUNE 2021 (THSD USD)
The Ukrcement Association has asked Ukrzaliznytsia to take into account the specifics of the cement industry when distributing wagons at auctions, as well as to reduce the use of specialized cement wagons for the transportation of other goods in high season, Chairman of the association, Pavlo Kachur said in an exclusive interview with Interfax-Ukraine.
According to him, among the urgent problems with the distribution of wagons, in particular, the lack of cement cars for transporting cement due to their use for the transportation of crushed stone and other bulk materials, and inappropriate offers at auctions in terms of the number of wagons.
“Cement producers lose to grain producers, power companies, crushed stone producers in routing. They are profitable clients for Ukrzaliznytsia. They load 40 wagons in one place, bring them to the port, a power plant or an open area, unload and this is the end of the work. And they tell us: bargain, there are wagons. But cement consumers have their own specifics, which we ask to also take into account. We have only a few consumers for 20-30 wagons. Basically three or five wagons are ordered, but such offers at auctions are not enough,” Kachur said.
In addition, until September 2021, Ukrzaliznytsia put up 170 cement carriages for sale per day exclusively for the shipment of cement, but in September-October this restriction was canceled and 80 cars were put up for the transport of bulk cargo.
“On October 21, 2021, Ukrzaliznytsia also canceled this division of cement cars by type of cargo, which caused a speculative jump in the railway tariff due to increased demand from shippers of bulk materials, while leaving cement producers without wagons for transporting cement. After all, cement, in contrast to other bulk materials can only be transported by cement wagons,” the chairman of Ukrcement said.
The sale of agricultural products and residues of its production for the operation of biogas plants can become a guarantor of the state’s energy security, the agricultural sector can significantly strengthen NJSC Naftogaz Ukrainy from the point of view of energy independence. As reported on the website of the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food on Tuesday with reference to Minister Roman Leshchenko, the adoption at the final reading bill No. 5464 on amendments to the law of Ukraine on alternative fuels regarding the development of biomethane production by the Verkhovna Rada last week gives Ukraine every chance to become a center for the production and supply of biomethane, as well as a source of energy security for Europe.
“In the conditions of very expensive energy resources – gas and electricity, not only food security, but also energy security is impossible without the agricultural sector,” Leshchenko said.
He said that the development of the biomethane market will allow Ukrainian farmers to obtain an alternative source of energy from waste and residues of their own production, and as a result, use biomethane instead of natural gas for the production of heat and electricity, as well as fuel for transport and raw materials for the chemical industry.
The majority of cement producers in Ukraine are forced to work with minimum margins due to the rise in coal prices by more than two times, the Ukrcement association has reported.
“The price swing for coal this year did not pass us by. The supply contracts were signed last year at an average price of $60 per tonne, and in August, suppliers agreed to ship coal at a price of at least $175 per tonne. This creates significant pressure on the pricing policy. It is impossible to make cheap goods out of expensive components,” Chairman of the Ukrcement association Pavlo Kachur said in an interview with Interfax-Ukraine.
According to him, the cost of energy is 52-55% of the cost of clinker required for cement production. At the same time, all Ukrainian cement plants have previously been modernized and switched to coal due to the high price of gas.
The situation with the rise in prices for cement in Ukraine due to the rise in prices for coal is not unique and is observed in the markets of other countries, Kachur said.
“For example, Turkish cement producers sharply raised cement prices in July due to the rise in the cost of coal. We proceeded from the fact that we must take into account the needs of consumers. Therefore, some companies significantly minimized margins in order to go through this difficult period with minimal costs for cement plants and the construction market as a whole,” he said.
