Main trade partners of Ukraine in % from total volume (export from Ukraine to other countries) Jan-June 2021
SSC of Ukraine
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky signed a decree that changed the composition of the National Investment Council on Monday, September 27.
According to decree No.488/2021 released on the presidential website, the following officials were included to the National Investment Council’s staff: Chairman of the Board of Directors of VEON Ltd. (Kingdom of the Netherlands) Gennady Gazin; chief representative of the Polish state oil and gas company “PGNiG S.A.” in Ukraine (Republic of Poland) Ireneusz Derek; Infrastructure Minister of Ukraine Oleksandr Kubrakov; First Deputy Prime Minister of Ukraine, Economy Minister Oleksiy Liubchenko; President of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) Odile Renaud-Basso; Deputy Head of the President’s Office of Ukraine Yulia Svyrydenko and Vice President of the European Investment Bank Teresa Czerwińska.
According to the decree, the following officials were removed from the National Investment Council: former member of the supervisory board of NJSC Naftogaz Ukrainy Yulia Kovaliv; former Infrastructure Minister Vladyslav Krykliy, former Economy Minister Ihor Petrashko, former President of the EBRD Suma Chakrabarti.
The decree comes into force on the day of its publication.
The European Commission (EC) welcomes Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s determination to fight the deeply rooted influence of vested oligarchic interests on the country’s life and expects the next steps in this direction.
The European Commission said this to the Interfax-Ukraine agency on Friday commenting the adoption of the law on de-oligarchisation by the Verkhovna Rada.
“We welcome President Zelensky’s determination to address the deeply rooted influence of vested oligarchic interests in the political and economic life of Ukraine,” the European Commission said.
The diplomats in Brussels underscored the adoption of the bill “On the prevention of threats to national security associated with the excessive influence of persons with significant economic or political heft in public life (oligarchs)” at the second reading in the Verkhovna Rada on 23 September. “This is a step forward. We expect the law to be implemented fully and with determination, in a legally sound manner. We believe that in addition to the implementation of the adopted law, more steps are needed, in particular to close Ukraine’s institutional gaps, to achieve the desired de-oligarchizing effect,” they noted.
At the same time the European Commission stressed that Ukraine “invested a lot of efforts into closing the space for corrupt practicing, by i.a. cleaning the banking sector and ensuring transparency of the public procurement.” “We encourage to continue these efforts in others sectors prone to corrupt practices,” the diplomats said.
They are convinced that “strengthening of planned and existing institutions (such as the rule of law authorities, including the court system; the Anti-Monopoly Committee; the public broadcaster; an independent press regulator among others) should stand at the heart of this fight to consolidate the rule of law, shore up the trust of Ukrainian citizens in public institutions and, not least, to unleash Ukraine’s economic potential for the benefit of all people of Ukraine.”
The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine has approved an agreement with the Government of the Republic of Peru to abolish visa requirements for short stays.
The relevant decision was made at the Wednesday government meeting.
This agreement was signed in Kyiv on July 15, 2021. The agreement provides for the abolition of visa requirements for the entry and stay of citizens of countries on the territory of the state of the other party for up to 90 days within 180 days.
For citizens of Ukraine, the possibility of visa-free tourist trips to Peru for up to 183 days will remain, which Peru introduced by a unilateral decision in 2003.
The Ukrainian Climate Fund, which is currently being developed by the Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resource, may be launched early 2023, Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources of Ukraine Roman Abramovsky has told the Green Deal portal.
“In any case, this fund can be launched at the beginning of 2023, because any budget documents involving changes in the receipts and expenditure are submitted before July 1,” the minister said.
At the same time, he said that there is still a lot of work to be done on the design and modeling of the Ukrainian Climate Fund, as well as in the adoption of a bill that will approve this fund.
“Nevertheless, I believe that this is objectively possible. One of the main tasks at this stage is to enlist the support of international financial institutions that can be investors within the fund and multiply the effect of the income from environmental taxes. There is no other way!” he said.
According to him, the ministry is negotiating with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the World Bank.
The minister also said that at the time of launch, the fund will have about UAH 8 billion of its own funds received from the proceeds from the tax on CO2 emissions and other environmental taxes.
Sugar production in Ukraine as of September 20 amounted to 74,900 tonnes. According to a report on the website of the Ukrtsukor National Association of Sugar Producers, in total, 629,800 tonnes of sugar beet had been processed.
According to the data on the website of the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food, as of September 16, Ukrainian agrarians harvested 506,300 tonnes of sugar beet (4.7% of the forecast) with a yield of 47.72 tonnes per ha.
As reported, the current season of sugar beet refining started in the country on August 21.
