Public joint-stock company Ukrgazvydobuvannia, the subsidiary of natioanl joint-stock company Naftogaz Ukrainy, boosted natural gas production by 4.4% in 2017, to UAH 15.25 billion, and this year the company seeks to increase it to almost 16 billion cubic meters (bcm), Ukrainian Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman has said.
“I think that this year we will be able to increase production [of natural gas by Ukrgazvydobuvannia] to almost 16 bcm. We now have 15.25 bcm, and it will be more than 16 bcm next year,” the prime minister said, opening the government meeting on Wednesday and summing up the implementation of the government’s program over the past year.
He recalled that in 2016, a drop in natural gas production by state-owned companies was seen.
“We must ensure the production of at least 20 bcm of Ukrainian gas by 2020,” Groysman said.
Ukraine has come close to the completion of negotiations on mutual recognition of documents and visa-free regime with the Republic of Korea following a visit of the delegation of the Interior Ministry, which ended on Tuesday, Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said.
“During a brief visit to Seoul, the delegation of the Interior Ministry managed to discuss a number of key cooperation issues. At a meeting with the interior minister, the general commissioner of police, the head of the Presidential Council, we did our work to conclude negotiations on the package on the mutual recognition of personal documents of citizens, driving licenses and visa-free regime for citizens of Ukraine,” Avakov wrote on his Facebook page.
At the same time, he noted “high motivation and interest of the Korean side in cooperation with Ukraine”, including in the industrial and technical areas, space programs, infrastructure and agricultural projects.
According to Avakov, on Thursday the Interior Ministry, together with the Foreign Ministry, held a coordination meeting of the services on the implementation of the agreements reached.
“Do we need a visa-free travel with the 11th economy of the world? The question is rhetorical! I am very glad that we managed to come close to an agreement on this issue… We will do our best so that in a short while each of you reading these lines should have an opportunity to learn this first hand – by using the visa-free travel with South Korea for business or travel purposes,” Avakov added.
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has issued a $50 million loan to Nibulon LLC to finance the expansion and modernization of the company’s grain logistics infrastructure in 2018-2019.
The corresponding agreement was signed at the EBRD office in Kyiv on February 15, 2018.
The financing will consist of an A loan of up to $40 million provided by the EBRD and a B loan of up to $10 million, which will be syndicated by commercial banks.
The loan will be used for the three-year investment program of Nibulon, which includes, inter alia, the construction of three new grain terminals, the expansion of the flotilla, including a new floating crane, tugboats, barges and a self-propelled dredging vessel, as well as the construction of a storage facility of 42,000 tonnes, a berth on a barge and a new railway at Mykolaiv terminal. It will allow increasing the volume of cargo transportation by inland waterways to 4 million tonnes per year, as well as raise grain exports to 8 million tonnes per year.
The EBRD said the loan is provided for a period of seven years.
A member of Ryanair board Juliusz Komorek has confirmed plans earlier announced by Ukrainian Infrastructure Minister Volodymyr Omelyan to launch flights from Ukraine in autumn 2018. “This is a real date. I hope this would happen,” he said in an interview with Poland’s Fly4free publication, adding that changes would be made to the routes announced last year.
Earlier Omelyan said that Ukraine in the final stage of negotiations with Ireland’s low cost airline Ryanair.
The surplus of Ukraine’s foreign trade in services in 2017 increased by 12% compared to 2016, to $5.087 billion (in 2016 some $4.542 billion), the State Statistics Service has said.
According to its data, exports of services in 2017 rose by 5.9% (by $578.6 million), to $10.447 billion, imports by 0.6% (by $32.7 million), to $5.359 billion.
The ratio of coverage of imports by exports stood at 1.95 (in 2016 at 1.85).
Foreign trade operations were conducted with partners from 225 countries.
Public joint-stock company ArcelorMittal Kryvyi Rih (Dnipropetrovsk region) cut consumption of all types of energy in 2017: the total power consumption was 25.231 GJ per tonne of liquid steel.
The company said in a press release on Tuesday that for 2018 it is planned to have 25.198 GJ of power consumption.
ArcelorMittal Kryvyi Rih still introduces “green” technologies, which allows using alternative fuels to reduce the use of conventional energy.
“Our goal is to save about $5 million by increasing energy efficiency in 2018,” Head of the energy efficiency department Oleksandr Yefremov said.
According to the press service, more than 70% of all energy consumed by the company are electricity and gaseous fuels (natural, blast-furnace, coke oven gases). The structure of energy consumption also includes water, steam, air blast and oxygen.
ArcelorMittal Kryvyi Rih is the largest producer of steel products in Ukraine. Its core business is production of long products, in particular, reinforcement and wire rod.
