KYIV. Sept 5 (Interfax-Ukraine) – U.S. Avellana Gold has acquired a number of companies holding licenses for production and exploration of polymetallic ores in western Ukraine and is negotiating the practical implementation of a project for extraction of metals, the State Service of Geology and Natural Resources has said.
“Today we are fully aware of the geological and operational risks of the project, the high demands of local communities as for environmental friendliness, as well as the actual inability to attract long-term debt capital to the country with a pre-default rating,” Avellana Gold head and shareholder Brian C Savage said.
According to a press release, the service management has recently held a formal meeting with the company representatives in order to discuss the basic conditions of cooperation and obtaining guarantees of its long-term period.
Savage said Avellana Gold would like to receive a signal from the government that the country really needs a big project for extraction and enrichment of polymetallic ores and guarantees of stability of license conditions and regulatory rules in the sphere of subsoil use.
KYIV. Sept 5 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukraine could from 2017 introduce a system of public health insurance, Deputy Health Minister Pavlo Kovtoniuk has said.
“We have to implement a system of national health insurance in 2017,” he said at a briefing in Kyiv.
According to Kovtoniuk, the Health Ministry plans in the near future to represent a plan of introduction of the national health insurance system.
“This plan is very cumbersome. It involves serious changes in the regulatory framework, including laws, adoption of resolutions by the Cabinet,” the deputy minister added.
Kovtoniuk expressed hope for fruitful cooperation with the profile parliamentary committee and joint development of changes to legislation.
“The profile committee has developed bills. We agree on some of them and see opportunity for cooperation. The main thing we are united with the committee in the need to introduce a national health insurance system,” he said.
KYIV. Sept 5 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The governments of Ukraine and Germany are discussing the possibility of launching projects of soft loans for housing for internally displaced persons (IDP) for EUR52 million, the minister for the temporarily occupied territories and internally displaced persons of Ukraine, Vadym Chernysh, has said.
“We together with Germany’s credit institution KfW are discussing a separate project not to just gift housing and make some kind of “social ghettos” but provide IDPs with the possibility of buying it at a low rate or paying by installments,” he said on the air of TV Channel Five.
He noted the issue is being discussed at the level of the governments of Germany and Ukraine and the matter concerns about EUR52 million.
The minister said at present the issue of providing IDPs with housing has not been resolved, while the previous project of villages consisting of block houses, which other countries provided to Ukraine, failed because due to no jobs in such villages the crime rate was rapidly growing there.
KYIV. Sept 5 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Production and exports of sunflower oil from Ukraine in the 2015/2016 marketing year (MY, September-August) increased by 10%, to 4.85 million tonnes and 4.4 million tonnes respectively.
“Sunflower oil production, according to preliminary data, is estimated at 4.85 million tonnes, while exports at 4.4 million tonnes. This is 10% more compared with the previous year,” the Ukroliyaprom association told Interfax-Ukraine.
The association explained the growth in production and export rates with the increase in the sunflower harvest in Ukraine.
According to Ukroliyaprom, Ukraine in the 2014/2015 MY produced 4.4 million tonnes of sunflower oil, exported 4 million tonnes.
During the 2015/2016 MY sunflower oil exports from Ukraine to the EU almost doubled, to 1.36 million tonnes.
“At present the industry shows a stable growth, the increase in processing rapeseeds, soybeans and flax is strategic for us,” the association said.
According to its data, in the 2015/2016 MY Ukrainian enterprises doubled flax processing to 30,000 tonnes.
KHARKIV. Sept 5 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Kharkiv Regional State Administration plans to sign a memorandum of cooperation with the German International Cooperation (GIZ), as well as with the Chinese Commerce Association in Ukraine in the framework of the eighth international economic forum “Innovations. Investments. Kharkiv Initiatives” to be held in Kharkiv on September 23.
In addition, in the framework of the forum it is planned to sign a roadmap between Kharkiv Regional State Administration and the People’s Republic of China, according to the preliminary program posted on the forum’s website.
The forum is organized by Kharkiv Regional Council and Kharkiv Regional State Administration. It is expected President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko will take part in the event.
