KYIV. March 20 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukraine’s Cabinet of Ministers has approved a project on construction of the second stage of Dnistrovska hydroelectric pumped storage power plant, consisting of unit four.
The decision was made at a government meeting on Thursday.
As reported, the hydroelectric generation development program until 2026 approved by government resolution No. 552-r dated July 13 envisages the start of construction of unit four in 2017 and its completion in 2020.
According to preliminary calculations it will cost UAH 2.796 billion. The capacity of the unit will be 324 MW in generating mode and 421 MW in pumping mode.
KYIV. March 20 (Interfax-Ukraine) – PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), an international audit company, will act as a partner of the Ukrainian government’s secretariat reform, Minister of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine Oleksandr Sayenko has said.
“International consulting company PwC Ukraine with support of the UK government will act as a partner of the Cabinet of Ministers’ secretariat reform. We start cooperating from the modernization of internal processes, the introduction of the common project management methods and the launch of the effective monitoring of the implementation of the public administration reform,” Sayenko wrote on his Facebook page last week.
“Our common goal is to make the Secretariat a powerful analytical center of the government, make it a flagship of the reform, work out the innovative methods on this platform and transfer experience of overcoming the institutional weakness to others. We will synchronously conduct intensive trainings for the staff and master the newest management methods,” the minister said.
Sayenko said that the success of the first cooperation phase will be assessed jointly with The Good Governance Fund.
Ukrainian Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman said that the government’s secretariat reform is one of the preconditions for the effective work of the government in general. This work was started last year.
“Recently it was reported that international consulting company PwC Ukraine will be our partner in the process with support of the UK government,” the prime minister wrote on his Facebook page.
The Good Governance Fund of the Department for International Development (DFID) of the UK supports several initiatives in management and economic reforms aimed at strengthening stability, curbing poverty and improving the well-being in Ukraine, Georgia, Moldova, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina.
LVIV. March 20 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The Lviv City Council and France’s Egis have signed a memorandum, according to which the company will design a project on reclamation of the Hrybovychi landfill for Lviv and the project on the new waste recycling complex.
Lviv Mayor Andriy Sadovy said at the signing ceremony that Egis has drawn up a project on reclamation of the Marseille landfill (France), being the largest in Europe. A grant of the French government of EUR 650,000 will be used to finance the works.
“The memorandum with Egis is signed for nine months. I am sure that we will see first results in May. This is a comprehensive work to be carried out. We are handing all our preliminary studies in the issue to the French colleagues,” he said.
He said that the reclamation would start in 2017.
Ukrainian-Israeli economic cooperation only begins to open up the existing bilateral potential. Trade between the countries that kept at around US$1 billion for long slightly decreased in 2016. However, Ukraine has maintained a positive balance of foreign trade and has been able to attract potential investors and business partners from Israel. The latter see mainly IT, advanced technology, agriculture as promising areas for cooperation.
This issue was on the agenda of the international conference titled “On the Situation and Prospects of Ukrainian-Israeli Trade and Economic Relations,” which was arranged by the bilateral Business Council with the support of the embassies of both countries and the Ukrainian League of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs. The sides discussed algorithms to boost trade and investment-related cooperation, as well as risks, protection, insurance of business on the domestic markets.
President of the Ukrainian League of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs Anatoliy Kinakh noted that the level of direct investment from Israel is still quite low —up to US$ 50 million for the whole period, or 0.1% of the total volume of foreign investments. The leader of the business community is convinced that Ukraine, which is experiencing investment hunger, is attractive for investment. This is due to human, scientific and technical potential, proximity to European markets and high ROI of investment projects.
“Of course, we, on our part, need to ensure clear protection of the rights of owners and investors, the rule of law,” Kinakh said.
He also urged not to be limited to IT or agriculture, but develop cooperation in the reform of medicine, particularly rehabilitation of soldiers where Israel is a world leader.
The K.Fund of entrepreneur Vasyl Khmelnytsky has supported the opening in Ukraine of the representational office of the world Lean Global Network – Lean Institute Ukraine (LIU), a press release issued by the foundation has said.
According to the report, the Institute’s activity will be focused on promoting the knowledge of lean approach as one of the cutting edge methodologies that improve enterprises’ performance and optimize resources consumption.
“We believe that deeper understanding and use of lean thinking is a vital, effective strategy to help Ukrainian companies to go through serious transformation, to raise their competitiveness on local and international markets, and contribute into social and economic development of the country,” President and initiator of the project Serhiy Konberianov said.
Konberianov has large experience in the field as an independent lean consultant in Ukraine in the past five years.
Lean philosophy is derived mostly from the Toyota company, which grew to the world’s largest automaker with the help of lean manufacturing. The lean approach to work means that all the workers are engaged in daily continuous improvement of the operating processes, identifying and eliminating waste.
“This approach turns problems into opportunities for development, helps workers to grow, and aids the organization’s leadership in its market,” the fund said.
Lean Institute Ukraine will help spreading lean thinking and practice in Ukraine through publishing books, organizing summits, leading trainings and workshops. You can find the announcements of its events and books at lean.org.ua, as well as on the K.Fund site and on social networks. LIU is a member of Lean Global Network, which comprises 21 educational and research organizations and dozens of co-learning partners around the globe.
K.Fund was founded by Ukrainian entrepreneur Vasyl Khmelnytsky in 2015 to support education and economics projects.
The Ukrainian League of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (ULIE) has been popularizing the idea of co-financing under loan programs for energy efficiency with the use of the national and local budgets. Mykolaiv region has become an active participant in the ULIE’s initiative as for participation in the expanded model of funding for making buildings, private households and apartments more energy efficient.
The regional and city administrations together with the advisory center of the ULIE’s Commission for Energy Development and Energy Saving have held six workshops with participants in the program. Currently, the regional council is preparing a round table with local authorities for the discussion of methods of joint state and local funding programs for the so-called thermo modernization.
The sum of money allocated from the national budget in the amount of UAH 400 million this year to compensate loans under the thermo-modernization program is much lower than demand, the ULIE said earlier.
“The complicated economic situation in Ukraine and growing utilities tariffs encourage the introduction of energy efficiency and energy conservation technology in housing, as well as the social and budget-sustained sectors. An effective tool is the implementation of state, regional and municipal programs for popularizing energy efficiency measures among households. This will reduce energy consumption in homes to 60%, while saving billions of cubic meters of gas and electricity,” the ULIE said.
Work in this direction continues. It must be mentioned that a series of workshops on the implementation of energy efficiency measures in the corporate and municipal sectors, as well as in housing are being conducted by experts of the ULIE, the State Agency on Energy Efficiency and Energy Saving of Ukraine, and the local authorities in the regions of Ukraine.
