Ukraine has started preparations for negotiations on new agreements on a free trade area (FTA) with Egypt, Jordan, Indonesia and China, Minister of Economic Development, Trade and Agriculture Ihor Petrashko has said.
“Preparations are underway for negotiations on an FTA with Egypt, Jordan, Indonesia and China,” he said during a press conference in Kyiv on Tuesday.
He also said Ukraine has started negotiations with the EU on revising the Association Agreement.
Petrashko said the additional capitalization of the Export Credit Agency (ECA) to UAH 2 billion, which is provided by the 2021 national budget, will strengthen Ukraine’s export positions
The net international reserves of Ukraine as of January 1 amounted to $ 18.1 billion, which is 19% more than at the beginning of December 2020 ($ 15.2 billion), Head of the Council of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) Bohdan Danylyshyn has said.
“The net forex reserves of the NBU [excluding the debt to the IMF] as of January 1, 2021 amounted to $ 18.1 billion and are sufficient to cover payments by the public sector and the National Bank on external debt to non-residents, which in 2021 will amount to about $ 7.2 billion,” he said on Facebook.
Danylyshyn added that of the external debt to non-residents, about $ 2 billion should be paid by the government on eurobonds in September 2021, as well as to cover the current account deficit, which, according to the NBU forecast, is expected at $ 3.5 billion in 2021.
According to him, the volume of planned payments of the state in favor of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in 2021 is about $ 1.6 billion, including $ 1.36 billion for the repayment of the principal amount of the debt and $ 260 million for interest payments.
“The need to refinance Ukraine’s debt to the IMF requires the parties to fulfill their obligations under the current Stand-By Arrangement, which will allow Ukraine to attract IMF financing in the amount of about $ 2.9 billion,” he said.
He added that taking into account payments on the debt of banking and corporate sectors, as well as inter-company debt, the total volume of payments from Ukraine in favor of non-residents in 2021 will be about $ 15.5 billion.
As reported, the international reserves of Ukraine in 2020 increased by 15% and amounted to $ 29.1 billion as of January 1, 2021.
The supply chain company Czarnikow (the UK) has signed a representative agreement with the Ukrainian company Entrypoint, created by the ex-managers of Astarta, to finance, procure and supply food ingredients and packaging for companies in Ukraine, Entrypoint said in a press release.
“This partnership is built on Entrypoint’s long standing history in the food and beverage industry in Ukraine, and surrounding markets, together with Czarnikow’s global presence, supply chain capabilities, financing and sourcing,” William Rook, Czarnikow Director and Head of Ingredients, said.
Mykola Kovalski, the co-founder of Entrypoint, has collaborated with Czarnikow in the past through his work with leading Ukrainian food and energy businesses. He was Business Development Manager at Astarta Group, Ukraine’s leading sugar producer.
“As consumer demand across the region is becoming more exquisite and diverse, Entrypoint will be instrumental in connecting Czarnikow with reliable end buyers,” he said.
“Having signed an agency agreement with Entrypoint Group, a business intelligence consultancy in Ukraine, Czarnikow will be leveraging its global platform to competitively source, ship and finance food ingredients and packaging to Ukraine and the surrounding markets of Moldova, Georgia and Belarus,” the report says.
“Best known for its 160 years of experience in the global sugar market, in recent years Czarnikow has expanded its product offering to include food ingredients and packaging such as dairy, sweeteners, fruit and PET. These products have brought new opportunities both with longstanding, established clients and new potential markets. To make the most of new opportunities, Czarnikow is working with individuals with local on-the-ground understanding of specific regions,” according to the press release.
Entrypoint provides transaction and risk advisory services with a regional focus on Ukraine, the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.
The mobile network operator Kyivstar has begun to use a digital graphic signature on the screen to connect contract subscribers to its network in its branded stores, as well as in national and regional multi-brand electronics networks.
The operator’s press service said on Monday that the introduction of the digital graphic signature is an opportunity to speed up service and use a more environmentally friendly way of document flow that does not require paper consumption.
“Subscribers and store employees do not need to spend time preparing and printing paper documents. As a result, now it takes only about 5 minutes to sign mobile phone contracts,” the press service said.
Kyivstar said that the digital graphic signature is a handwritten signature of an individual on the tablet screen, linked to the contract, and is confirmed by a qualified electronic signature of the operator.
The functionality became possible thanks to the introduction of Jet, the new application for service and sales in Kyivstar branded stores and multi-brand electronics networks.
Prime Minister of Ukraine Denys Shmyhal has said that almost 550,000 jobs were saved thanks to government business support programs.
“The key role here was played by the partial unemployment program, according to which state support for business amounted to more than UAH 3 billion,” Shmyhal wrote on Facebook.
According to him, thanks to state support in 2020, more than 600,000 Ukrainians were employed.
The Lekhim group of pharmaceutical companies has signed an agreement to supply 5 million doses of CoronaVac vaccine against COVID-19 produced by the Chinese company Sinovac Biotech in the first half of 2021, the company said in a press release on its website.
“Lekhim Group and Sinovac Biotech, which are partners, have reached an agreement in negotiations that lasted for 10 months on cooperation in the distribution and localization of production in Ukraine of the vaccine against the SARS-CoV-2 virus for a period of five years,” the press release reads.
According to the report, Lekhim is the official and exclusive supplier of CoronaVac vaccine in Ukraine.
The release recalls that in addition to the sale of the CoronaVac vaccine, cooperation involves the organization of production of finished dosage forms of vaccines (including CoronaVac) from 2022 in Ukraine (Lekhim-Kharkiv), and from 2025 it is planned to organize a full production cycle of the main list of vaccines.
Sinovac Biotech is a Chinese vaccine producing company founded in Beijing in 2001 with a capacity of 300 to 500 million doses of six types of vaccines for humans and animals per year. Sinovac’s main products are vaccines against hepatitis A (prequalified by the WHO) and B, influenza, mumps, chickenpox, which are registered and approved for vaccination in 34 countries around the world.
CoronaVac is an inactivated vaccine. It uses a traditional vaccine mechanism in which a non-living virus that cannot replicate in human cells is used to activate the immune system. Phase 3 trials of the Chinese vaccine have already taken place in Brazil and Indonesia. Tests are ongoing in Turkey and Chile.
