The European side has proposed a new framework of work with the goal of signing a long-term contract for the supply of Russian gas through Ukraine after 2020, and the Ukrainian side hopes it will be signed before the end of this year, Minister of Energy and Environment Protection of Ukraine Oleksiy Orzhel has said.
“Today we’ve discussed with our European partners and accepted new proposals regarding the framework for working with a gas transit contract. We fully support these proposals and are grateful to our European partners for them,” Orzhel said following the fourth round of talks in the trilateral Ukraine-Russia-European Commission format in Brussels.
According to him, these proposals “are based on a ten-year contract, as well as on volumes of 60 billion cubic meters of stable volumes and 30 billion cubic meters of variable volumes of gas transportation by the gas transportation system.”
“There are additional points that we sign a transport agreement in accordance with European law,” the minister stressed.
At the same time, he assured that Ukraine has a clear position in order to guarantee stable supplies in the European direction.
“We hope that we will sign the agreement (on transit) before the end of the year and ensure the reliability of supplies to the European market,” he added.
Official rates of banking metals from national bank as of october 29
One troy ounce=31.10 grams
National bank of Ukraine’s official rates as of 29/10/19
Source: National Bank of Ukraine
Vega, a large Ukrainian telecoms operator, in January-September 2019 received UAH 503 million of net income, which is 7% more than in the same period in 2018.
According to the company’s website, EBITDA for the specified period reached UAH 153.5 million, which is 21% more than last year. At the same time, the company managed to increase ARPU (average revenue per user) by 10%.
The amount of capital investment in January-September 2019 compared to the same period in 2018 rose to UAH 59.3 million. Basically, as Vega notes, funds were invested in upgrading networks and equipment.
“The priority of the company as a national telecoms operator is the continuous improvement of services in all regions of our presence. One of the main tasks in this direction is to transfer all customers who receive services via copper networks to optical ones. We have been working on this since last year and have positive results. Over 40,000 telephony and Internet subscribers have already appreciated the benefits of new technologies,” the press service of the company said citing its CEO Murat Chinar.
Vega transferred UAH 99.8 million in taxes and fees to the budgets of Ukraine.
The national telecoms operator Vega offers solutions in the field of fixed telephony, broadband Internet access and data transfer. It is part of the telecommunications sector of SCM Group belonging to Rinat Akhmetov.
Currently, Vega is present in 22 regions of Ukraine.
The Office of the President of Ukraine hopes that the Ukrainian parliament will consider a bill on demonopolization of the spirit sector in Ukraine next week and that the preparations of state-owned enterprise Ukrspyrt will start, Deputy Head of the Office of the President Yulia Kovaliv has said.
“According to our estimates, the privatization of Ukrspyrt will bring us at least UAH 5 billion,” she said at a press briefing in Kyiv on Monday.
Kovaliv recalled that last week, the president introduced a bill on the demonopolization of alcohol production in the country to the Verkhovna Rada.
“Now alcohol is produced by the state-owned enterprise Ukrspyrt, while in another law we stipulate that all licenses for the production of alcohol can be granted only to state-owned enterprises. Actually, in conditions of non-liberalized production of alcohol in Ukraine, Ukrspyrt can only be sold at the price of scrap metal. We hope that next week this law on the demonopolization of the alcohol industry will be adopted and, together with this, preparations will be made for the privatization of Ukrspyrt,” Kovaliv said.
State-owned enterprise Ukrspyrt is a major producer of alcohol and alcohol-containing products in Ukraine. Until now, it was under the control of the Ministry of Agricultural Policy and Food.
The total production capacity of the SOE is more than 36 million decaliters per year.
Its work is provided by 41 production sites.
Electricity consumption in Ukraine in January-September 2019, taking into account in-process losses, decreased by 0.6% compared to the same period in 2018, to 110.751 billion kWh, the Ministry of Energy and Coal Industry has told Interfax-Ukraine.
Excluding in-process losses, electricity consumption over the period decreased 0.1%, to 89.554 billion kWh.
The country’s industry, excluding in-process losses, reduced electricity consumption by 0.3%, to 38.551 billion kWh. In particular, metallurgical industry consumed 22.063 billion kWh (0.2% less compared to January-September 2018), fuel industry some 2.533 billion kWh (3.4% less), machine building industry some 2.734 billion kWh (8% less), chemical and petrochemical some 2.702 billion kWh (12.8% more), food and processing some 3.295 billion kWh (1.1% more), construction materials some 1.669 billion kWh (0.7% less), while others 3.555 billion kWh (1.4% less).
In addition, agricultural enterprises consumed 2.778 billion kWh (3% down), transport 4.856 billion kWh (4.6% less), and construction 711.1 million kWh (2.9% more).
In January-September 2019, the country’s population consumed 25.937 billion kWh (0.3% less), household consumers some 11.277 billion kWh (0.7% less), and other non-industrial consumers some 5.444 billion kWh (9.4% more).
In January-September 2019, the share of industry in total electricity consumption decreased from 43.1% to 43%, and the share of the population remained at 29%.
