Volodymyr Zelensky took the office as Ukrainian president at a ceremony hosted by the Verkhovna Rada. President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky has signed a decree on early termination of the powers of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine and appointed early elections on July 21, 2019.
Capital investments in Ukraine in January-March 2019 increased by 17.8%, whereas in the first quarter of 2018 by 37.4%, the State Statistics Service has reported.
The World Bank has affirmed the forecast for growth of Ukraine’s GDP at 2.7% in 2019, World Bank Country Director for Belarus, Moldova and Ukraine Satu Kahkonen has said.
Growth of Ukraine’s real GDO in 2020 would accelerate to 3.3%, in 2021 – to 3.8%, in 2022 – to 4.1% with the gradual decline in inflation to 6%, 5.7% and 5.3% respectively, according to the forecast of social and economic development of Ukraine for 2020-2022 approved by the government.
The growth of Ukraine’s real GDP in the first quarter of 2019 slowed down to 2.2% compared to the same period last year, against 3.5% in the fourth quarter of 2018 and 3.3% in 2018 as a whole, according to preliminary data posted by the State Statistics Service.
The Ministry of Economic Development and Trade has tentatively estimated the growth of Ukraine’s real gross domestic product (GDP) in January-March 2019 compared to the same period of 2018 at 2.2%, while in the fourth quarter of 2018 GDP growth was 3.5%.
Growth of Ukraine’s real GDP in the first quarter of 2019 year-over-year slowed to 2.4% compared with 3.5% in the fourth quarter of 2018 and 3.3% in 2018, the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) has said in its inflation report posted.
The deficit of Ukraine’s foreign trade in goods in January-March 2019 grew by 13% compared with January-March 2018, to $1.456 billion, the State Statistics Service said.
The deficit of Ukraine’s balance of foreign trade in the first quarter of 2019 totaled $390.5 million, which is 75.4% more than in January-March 2018 (the deficit of $222.6 million), the State Statistics Service has reported.
The surplus of Ukraine’s foreign trade in services in January-March 2019 increased by 2% compared with January-March 2018, to $1.489 billion ($1.461 billion in Q1 2018), the State Statistics Service has reported.
The volume of services rendered by enterprises in Ukraine in January-March 2019 amounted to UAH 215.2 billion, which in comparable prices is 2.7% more than the level of the same period in 2018, according to the State Statistics Service of Ukraine.
Inflation in Ukraine in April 2019 was 1% compared to 0.9% in March, 0.5% in February and 1% in January, the State Statistics Service of Ukraine has reported.
The deficit of the national budget in January-April 2019 totaled UAH 1.718 billion, according to a posting on the website of the State Treasury Service of Ukraine.
The deficit of Ukraine’s national budget in January-April 2019 totaled UAH 0.9 billion compared with UAH 26.17 billion in January-March 2019 and the limit of UAH 90 billion for 2019, the Finance Ministry reported.
Money stock in Ukraine in April 2019 expanded by 0.8%, to UAH 1.263 trillion, the relevant data of monetary statistics have been posted on the website of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU).
The aggregate state (direct) and state-guaranteed debt of Ukraine in April 2019 grew by 1.3%, or $1.03 billion, to $79.82 billion.
The international reserves of Ukraine in April 2019 decreased by 0.5%, to $20.525 billion (in equivalent) due to the significant amount of public debt repayments, according to preliminary data posted on the website of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU).
Industrial production in Ukraine in April 2019 increased by 5.2% compared with April 2018, after a rise of 2.1% in March and a fall of 1.8% and 3.3% in February and January respectively, the State Statistics Service has reported.
Industrial prices in Ukraine in April 2019 decreased by 1.5%, after falling by 1% in March, growing by 1% in February and January, the State Statistics Service has said.
The volume of construction work performed in Ukraine in April 2019 increased by 29.4% compared with April 2018, while the indicator in March 2019 compared with March 2018 rose by 29.7%.
Retail trade turnover in Ukraine in comparable prices in January-April 2019 increased by 7.9% compared to January-April 2018, the State Statistics Service has reported.
PJSC ArcelorMittal Kryvyi Rih (Dnipropetrovsk region) has signed an agreement worth almost $30 million with the Chinese company CISDI for the modernization of the largest blast furnace (No. 9).
According to a press release of the company, the contract includes the development of engineering, the supply of basic equipment, its installation, supervision and training of the metallurgical plant’s personnel.
It is noted that the company has four blast furnaces, of which DP-9 is the largest one, its useful volume exceeds 5,000 cubic meters. It produces about half of all pig iron at the steel plant and is still considered one of the largest in Europe.
The modernization of the furnace will increase its productivity to 10,000 tonnes of pig iron per day using the existing raw materials and up to 12,000 tonnes using sinter and pellets. ArcelorMittal Kryvyi Rih plans to produce pellets after the construction of a pelletizing plant (the declared capacity is 4.5-5 million tonnes per year). Both projects are the key ones in the enterprise’s investment program for the renovation and construction of production facilities.
MS Social Project LLC (Kyiv), part of ICU Group, has announced the construction of Ukraine’s largest plant for recycling unsorted household solid waste using a special technology in Zhytomyr.
“The plant is expected to process about 82,000 tonnes of waste annually,” according to a report the company’s website.
“The technology provides for a closed semi-automatic waste treatment system consisting, in particular, of an installation for processing mixed and pre-sorted waste, a technology for the production, grinding and packaging of RDF fuel (for cement plants), a plant for processing biodegradable waste and eco-compost production, sites for recycling household and construction waste, as well as roof solar panels. The possibility of compost production using an anaerobic process is being considered,” the report says.
The processing depth of this technology is expected to reach 85–95%.
MS Social Project announced its intention to build the plant in July 2018, the investment volume was estimated at EUR 7-10 million.
Ukrzaliznytsia (Kyiv) has approved a concept of creating Station Company branch using a model of Germany’s Deutsche Bahn, Director for Strategic Development and Investment Policy at Ukrzaliznytsia Anton Sabolevsky has said in an interview with the Magistral news center.
He said that the implementation of the roadmap for the establishment of the branch will begin by the end of 2019.
“Our goal is to improve the station management system, to increase the efficiency of their activities, including by minimizing duplicate functions. The main goals include reducing financial costs,” Sabolevsky said.
At the same time, he recalled that the negative financial performance of the stations of the Passenger Company branch of JSC Ukrzaliznytsia in 2018 amounted to UAH 405 million.
The reorganization will take place in three stages. First, stations, which are now managed by the Passenger Company will be transferred to the new branch. Next, first-third class facilities of regional branches will be transferred in stages (in total, 106 stations at the first stage). Then the turn of fourth-fifth class facilities (around 1,200) will come. Subsequently, the flag stations will join them. There are almost 2,300 of them in Ukrzaliznytsia, Sabolevsky said, explaining the action plan for the near future.
According to him, the staff will also be transferred to the new branch.
