Ukraine and Israel will sign a free trade area (FTA) agreement at the end of November, Ukrainian Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman has said after a meeting with new ambassador of Israel to Ukraine Joel Lion in Kyiv on Tuesday.
“The document will significantly expand our economic cooperation and will increase trade, which now amounts to $1 billion a year,” the head of government said on his Facebook page.
Groysman also said that this month in Kyiv there will be a Ukrainian-Israeli innovative summit, the participants of which will be representatives of about 50 enterprises working in the field of high technologies.
“We consider cooperation in the sphere of innovations to be one of the most promising,” the Ukrainian prime minister said.
As reported, Ukraine and Israel completed negotiations on signing a FTA agreement in April and intend to sign it by the end of 2018. Early August, the sides finished a legal reconciliation of the text of the FTA agreement. The next step in preparing the agreement for signing is the translation of the agreed text into Ukrainian and Hebrew.
From the moment the document enters into force, Israel intends to abolish 80% of duties on industrial goods, as well as a number of agricultural products – within quotas. Import duties on the agricultural products specified in the agreement will be completely canceled during the transition periods for three, five and seven years. Partial liberalization is envisaged for a separate category of goods.
Ukraine, in turn, intends to open 70% of the industrial goods market for Israeli producers, as well as abolish duties on a number of agricultural products immediately after the entry into operation of the agreement, for some of them within three or five years. In particular, Ukraine plans to reduce tariffs for certain seasonal vegetables and fruits from Israel.
Israel will be the 46th country, with which Ukraine signs the FTA agreement.
PrJSC Ukrainian Agro-Insurance Company (Kyiv) in the first nine months of 2018 increased premium collection by 46.04%, to UAH 20.616 million, the Standard-Rating agency has reported, affirming the company’s financial stability rating at the level of “uaAA” on the national scale.
The agency notes, when updating the rating, it based on the results of the analysis of the company’s activities for the specified period.
Net premiums of the company grew by 17.78%, to UAH 14.1 million, earned premiums by 6.88%, to UAH 12.169 million.
The share of individuals in the company’s portfolio is 1.06%.
Insurance premiums to insurers tripled to UAH 6.548 million. Return on sales was 33.8%, while in the first nine months of 2017 some 41.21%.
Agricultural insurance accounts for 65.51% in the insurance portfolio of the company, auto insurance for 19.41%, and medical insurance for 9.27%.
Ukrainian Agro-Insurance Company has been operating in the country’s market since 1995.
Ukrainian agrarians as of November 5 had sowed 7 million hectares with winter grains with the projected area being 7.2 million hectares for the 2019 harvest.
According to a report on the website of the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food, 6 million hectares of the area were sown with winter wheat, with the forecast being 6.2 million hectares, 120,000 hectares with rye with the forecast standing at 150,000 hectare, and 870,000 hectares with winter barley with the forecast being 870,000 hectares.
In addition, one million hectares were sown with winter rapeseeds, with a forecast of 890,000 hectares.
“We are reaching the projected result of 7.2 million hectares under winter crops for grain. As of November 5, about 150,000 hectares more were sown than on the same date last year,” First Deputy Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food Maksym Martyniuk said on Facebook.
According to him, the work was carried out within the best terms, the level of soil moisture was sufficient both for sowing and to ensure the best conditions for growth and development.
“The availability of material and technical resources was at the level or above the need. The availability of mineral fertilizers for the autumn field work amounted to 776,000 tonnes or 108% of the application, in particular phosphate fertilizers amounted to 207,000 tonnes (109% of the need),” Martyniuk reported.
Japan Credit Bureau (JCB), the largest payment system in Japan and one of the five largest payment systems in the world, is interested in entering the Ukrainian market, the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) said on Facebook.
The relevant intentions were expressed by JCB General Manager Takashi Suetsugu at a meeting with the leadership of the National Bank.
“Mr. Suetsugu announced JCB’s interest in entering the Ukrainian market and the intention to submit a corresponding package of documents to the regulator in the near future. For his part, Yakiv Smolii welcomed JCB’s intention to work in Ukraine, noting that the National Bank stands for a competitive environment in the payment market and uniform rules of regulation for all participants,” the report says.
According to JCB, as of the end of 2017 some 117 million customers were holders of its cards. The total annual transaction volume of the system was $281 billion. To date, JCB payment cards are serviced in 190 countries of the world. Payment cards are issued in 23 countries.
In total, there were 43 payment systems in Ukraine as of October 1, 2018, including the NBU Electronic Payment System, 29 systems for servicing transfers within the country, and 13 systems for cross-border remittance.
The market of new commercial vehicles in Ukraine (including heavy) in January-October 2018 increased by 13% compared to the same period in 2017, to 10,500 units, the Ukrautoprom association has reported. Thus, according to the results of 10 months, the market slightly slowed down the growth rates (in January-June, in particular, it was 24%). In October, the registration of these vehicles showed an increase both compared with the same month in 2017 (by 10%) and compared with September of the current year (by 13.1%), to 1,105 units. In September 2018, there was a drop respectively by 0.5% compared with September 2017 and by 12.5% compared with August 2018, to 977 units.
The greatest demand in the October market was still on Renault vehicles, which were registered 9% more than in October 2017 (163 vehicles).
Fiat ranked second with 121 registrations, a 7% increase from last year’s October figure, while Citroen closed the top three with a more than threefold increase, to 103 units.
Mercedes-Benz with a 40% increase and registration of 91 vehicles was in the fourth position, and Volkswagen was fifth, which increased sales by 56%, to 75 units.
The Belarusian MAZ came next with the registration of 73 vehicles and an increase of more than 43% compared with October last year.
Ukrainian brands ZAZ and KrAZ were respectively the 14th and 17th of the October rating with registration of 21 vehicles (against 12 in October last year) and 17 vehicles (against 35).
