KYIV. June 25 (Interfax-Ukraine) – President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko and UniCredit Group board chairman Giuseppe Vita have discussed the prospects of improving the activity of foreign investors in Ukraine, the presidential press service has reported.
The president noted the importance of cooperation with the Italian bank and the importance of cooperation between the two countries.
He stressed the importance of Italian support of Ukraine, which is reflected in the recent position of the G7 and the European Union on extending sanctions against Russia.
Poroshenko said Ukraine’s economic policy and legislative changes are aimed at creating the most transparent business environment, in particular – foreign.
“Ukraine demonstrates real efforts in the fight against corruption, the rule of law, stability and ensuring a greater transparency of the financial and banking system,” Poroshenko said.
“At the same time, the parties agreed that as a result of concerted actions of the Ukrainian authorities, including the National Bank, [the country] managed to achieve significant progress in establishing transparent, fair and favorable conditions for the activities of banks in Ukraine,” reads the report.
“We are open for cooperation, and the operations of banks, including foreign [banks], and reliable partners such as UniCredit, are very important for us. The resumption of economic growth is impossible without the financial system, and UniCredit plays an important role in this system,” Poroshenko added.
The UniCredit Group chairman in turn expressed his belief that Ukraine deserves a better future.
Vita spoke about the long history of cooperation between Italy and Ukraine.
“The position of UniCredit Group from 2007 until present time shows that we believe in the future of Ukraine,” he stressed.
The two men discussed the further financial initiatives of UniCredit in Ukraine, the prospects of stabilization, and renewal of the Ukrainian economic growth.
KYIV. June 24 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Businessmen fear that after the introduction of the electronic value added tax (VAT) administration on the permanent basis they would have to stop paying the tax and stop operations in general until the electronic system is revoked or improved.
According to the Ukrainian League of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (ULIE), the businessmen said this during a poll.
A total of 1,822 businessmen were polled. A total of 1,483 of respondents said that during the transition period the man hours for the electronic VAT administration grew, and 79% of respondents said that they saw losses due to the introduction of the system. 950 respondents expect that working capital will be washed out after the introduction of the system.
KYIV. June 24 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Public joint-stock company Agrarian Fund will start selling flour in retail chains within the next month and plans to occupy 30% of the Ukrainian packaged flour market in the future, Agrarian Fund Board Chairman Andriy Radchenko said at a press conference in Kyiv on Tuesday.
“If we speak about the volume, we’re ready to sell around 10% of our monthly volume in retail chains. Agrarian Fund sells up to 40,000 tonnes [of flour] a month, so this is around 4,000 tonnes,” he said.
Radchenko said the Agrarian Fund plans to start selling flour in retail chains in Kyiv and then expand into regional retail chains. In the future, Agrarian Fund will also start selling packaged sugar and buckwheat.
The Agrarian Fund product could also be extended with cereals.
KYIV. June 24 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukraine’s Cabinet of Ministers plans to sell 60.2% of shares of PJSC Zaporizhiaoblenergo power distribution company and 25% plus one share in PJSC Odesaoblenergo power distribution company until December 31, 2015.
This is stipulated in Cabinet resolution No. 626-r dated June 17, 2015, which is available on the government’s official website.
In keeping with Zaporizhiaoblenergo’s sale schedule, 5% of its shares will be sold at an auction between June 30 to September 30, 2015, and 55.248% of shares will be put up for sale June 30 through December 31, 2015.
Odesaoblenergo’s sale schedule foresees the sale of 25% shares at an auction between June 30 and December 31, 2015.
For sale will also be offered Mykolayiv combined heat and power plant and PJSC Sumykhimprom chemical enterprise.
In particular, a 5% stake in Mykolayiv combined heat and power plant will be sold at an auction from June 30 to September 30, 2015, another 94.17% of shares will be offered for sale between June 30 to December 31, 2015.
Sumykhimprom’s sale schedule foresees the sale of 5% of the chemical plant’s shares at an auction between May 31 to September 30, 2015, and a 94.995% stake will be sold from June 30 to December 31, 2015.
KYIV. June 24 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukrainian Premier Arseniy Yatseniuk has ordered for trade agencies to be set up in the countries which account for most of Ukraine’s international trade: United States, European Union (Brussels), Germany, France, China and in the Middle East.
“Don’t get scattered. But by the end of this year this [the opening of the agencies] should be promptly done,” he said during the extended board meeting of the Economic Development and Trade Ministry.
Yatseniuk praised the work of the trade representative of Ukraine – deputy minister Natalia Mykolska, who was commissioned with organizing the work of the prospective trade agencies.
Yatseniuk stressed that Ukraine needs a quality system to promote its economic interests abroad.
“The government should be an economic lawyer of the Ukrainian business abroad. Any international trip or [the trip] of the member of the Cabinet of Ministers must be met by a definite economic proposal,” he said.
KYIV. June 24 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko says that local budget revenues have already grown by 40% in the current year due to budget decentralization.
“We’ve already got the first results of budget decentralization. As of today, we’ve got the first statistics, which show that it’s the financial base of the local budget which has for the time grown by up to 40%, the local budgets have for the first time earned real money,” the president said during a meeting of the National Reforms Council in Kyiv on Tuesday.
According to Poroshenko, initiators of a respective bill were severely criticized back then. “Much anger was released against the initiators of the bill, which was once proposed to the public, [claiming that] it wouldn’t work, calculations were wrong, and these or those interests were not taken into consideration! But it’s exactly the opposite,” he stressed.
