KYIV. Feb 11 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The Infrastructure Ministry of Ukraine will create a Ukrainian roads geoinformation system thanks to funds received as part of the technical assistance from the European Union (EU), the director of the road market and transportation strategic development of the ministry, Roman Khmil wrote on his Facebook page.
“We’ve received financing for the creation of the Ukrainian roads geoinformation system. We want to create an integrated system that would be useful both for road workers, sector managers and the public,” he said.
Khmil said that earlier similar projects were created by volunteers, although they had restricted opportunities.
“The next step is designing of technical specifications that would describe the requirements to the system. Then we put it for the open and transparent tender,” Khmil wrote.
The ministry’s press service told Interfax-Ukraine that the EU technical assistance for the projects in the transport area will reach UAH 294 million, and some of the funds will be sent to the creation of the geoinformation system.
KYIV. Feb 11 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukraine has state-of-the-art rocket technologies, and Poland shows a serious interest to cooperation in their joint gradual promotion to the EU market, President of the Polish Space Agency (POLSA) Marek Banaszkiewicz has told Interfax-Ukraine.
“I think that there is a very large potential for promotion of rocket technologies that are well developed in Ukraine to the EU space market. This would be not an easy task: as you know, there is a mature market in Europe with companies that define the competitive positioning on the market,” he said after a first meeting of the ad hoc working group for space of the Ukrainian-Polish interagency commission for economic cooperation held in Kyiv and Dnipropetrovsk on February 8-10.
Banaszkiewicz said that today Ukraine “has access to the market that operates and develops on the verge of competition and cooperation and could take part in the competitive fight on it.”
“I think that first there is sense to develop cooperation in the area that are open for partnership,” he said, adding that one of the projects where Ukrainian rocket technologies could be of great demand is the Ariane 6 new-generation launcher program being implemented in the EU.
Among promising areas for bilateral partnership is the creation of new rockets, Banaszkiewicz said. One of the projects could be the project on the creation of a new European light launcher proposed for joint realization by the Polish Aviation Institute and Pivdenne Design Bureau (Dnipropetrovsk).
“No European country has offered the similar product to the market,” he added.
He said that one should not forget about possibilities of developing cooperation in the satellite area and creation of the Earth remote sensing systems.
“We should think of additional options for cooperation as part of the operation of our working group at the intergovernmental commission and move step by step,” he said.
Banaszkiewicz said that at present, the Polish government shows the interest to the development of space solutions, and first solutions in the interests of the security and defense sector as part of the future development of Polish industry.
Assessing the investment attractiveness of Pivdenne Design Bureau and Pivdenmash state enterprise that are being prepared for reformation, he expressed confidence that the two enterprises are interesting for investors.
The POLSA head said that these enterprises have a large number of skilled specialists.
“This is an excellent base for competitive fight with Arianespace,” he said.
KYIV. Feb 10 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The Ukrainian pharmaceutical market remains important and promising for Indian pharmaceutical companies, Head of the Indian delegation of the Ukrainian-Indian working group for healthcare and pharmaceutical market and Deputy Minister of Chemicals and Fertilizers of India Sudhansh Pant.
“Ukraine is a very important market for Indian pharmaceutical companies. It was and remains important and promising, despite the fact that in recent years the decline in goods turnover in the U.S. dollars was seen. Nevertheless, we’re working on returning the indicators of the goods turnover to the level we saw several years ago and increased them,” he told Interfax-Ukraine, commenting on the results of the second meeting of the Ukrainian-Indian working group held in January 2016 in Kyiv.
Pant said that the change of currency exchange rates resulted in growth of goods turnover between India and Ukraine in the hryvnia equivalent.
“We should say that goods turnover in hryvnias have an upward trend,” he said.
Pant also said that the meeting of the Ukrainian-Indian working group in January 2016 was the second meeting and the first meeting was held in 2013 in India.
“In general, there is a good opportunity to discuss all urgent issued appeared during cooperation at these meetings. During discussion one can see progress in achieving the goals set, clear up the positions of the sides to support development,” he said.
He also pointed at possibilities of implementing projects to localize production of medicines at facilities of Ukrainian pharmaceutical manufacturers and organize production by Indian pharmaceutical companies in Ukraine.
“Taking into account the potential of the Ukrainian pharmaceutical market, expectations from localization of production facilities are very positive. We will welcome projects on entering the Ukrainian market by Indian pharmaceutical companies to organize medicine production. I hope that we will see in the near future in what form it will happen and what contribution of Ukraine will be. In general, we see an upward trend both for the Ukrainian market and investment of Indian companies,” Pant said.
He also mentioned the fruitful work of the Indian Pharmaceutical Manufacturers’ Association in Ukraine (IPMA).
“At a meeting with representatives of the companies that are part of the IPMA the head of the IPMA association raised several problems that representative of Indian companies have to face in Ukraine, in particular, exports of medicines from India to Ukraine. We’ve discussed the issues and formed the position of India at the meeting of the working group. Some of the issuers were announced by India,” he said.
Pant said that India received a positive reaction from Ukraine.
He said that in general India positively assesses the negotiations.
KYIV. Feb 10 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The Business Ombudsman Council has proposed the government convene an expert group to develop changes to criminal laws, which would reduce pressure on business on the part of law enforcement agencies.
“We propose to the government set up an expert group to develop amendments to the Criminal Code and the Criminal Procedure Code, inviting our experts, law enforcement authorities, the Ministry of Justice and other interested parties to take part in the process,” Business Ombudsman Algirdas Semeta said at a press conference.
Deputy Business Ombudsman Yaroslav Hryhorchak explained that today one-third of complaints from businesses concern the actions of law enforcement agencies, in particular, the tax police.
According to him, major violations relate to the opening of criminal proceedings, refusal to open criminal proceedings, violations during investigations and the inefficient administration of pre-trial investigations.
He also added that the business ombudsman’s office proposes putting amendments to criminal laws, which would more protect businesses from law enforcers.
KYIV. Feb 10 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukraine’s ocean fishing fleet saw around UAH 19 million of profit in 2015 (over $700,000), including UAH 9.5 million ($350,000) of dividends that will be paid to the country by the state fishing company.
The State Fishing Industry Agency of Ukraine said in a Tuesday press release that this is first profit that the state will receive from operations of the ocean fishing fleet since 1997. The state company paid its debts to foreign creditors in full.
“Profit was received thanks to resumption of control over state-owned Fishing Company and state enterprise Service and unblocking of their operations, which are the owners of ships. The companies resumed collection of freight payments, and the freight rate was increased by almost 40%, to the market level. Debts of one of the companies were fully repaid,” the agency said, citing its head Yarema Kovaliv.
He said that since the moment of the signing of the agreement in 2004, the freight rate was revised only once and it was slightly increased.
The agency said that Ukrainian state companies registered in Crimea have not received funds under freight agreements since March 2014, and foreign freighter did not recognize Ukrainian directors and the country actually did not control its ships used in New Zealand. The debt for freight of Captain Rusak ship was $400,000, and for three other ships – $1.2 million.
“We held log negotiations with the freighter. Finally, control over Ukrainian fleet was returned, and freight rate was increased, and a possibility of revoking the contract under the initiative of the ship owner appeared. The conditions for credits were improved. In 2015, it was permitted to conduct reflagging. Due to amendments to New Zealand laws, ships under New Zealand’s flag can receive quotas for fish catch in this area,” Kovaliv said.
The agency said that the reflagging does not imply the change of the ship owner – Ukraine remains the owner of the fleet.
KYIV. Feb 10 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Poland sees a serious potential of partnership with Ukraine in the space area, and one of the most promising directions of cooperation in the new conditions could be the joint creation of space and rocket technologies, President of the Polish Space Agency (POLSA) Marek Banaszkiewicz has said.
At a meeting of the working group for the use of outer space of the intergovernmental Ukrainian-Polish commission for economic cooperation held in Kyiv, the POLSA head pointed at the creation of Earth remote sensing satellites as one of the promising direction of partnership.
“Ukraine and Poland have interesting practices in the area of Earth remote sensing data processing, but we’re also interested in the technology of creating spacecrafts of this kind, taking into account Ukraine’s achievements in the creation of Earth remote sensing satellites,” the press service of the State Space Agency of Ukraine reported, citing Banaszkiewicz.
He expressed confidence that uniting experience and Ukraine’s potential with the opportunities and knowledge of Poland in the space area has a serious competitive market potential.
