KYIV. Sept 18 (Interfax-Ukraine) – VISA International has expressed its desire to cooperate with Ukrposhta postal company, which has a network of 12,000 departments.
The press service of Ukrposhta has reported that a delegation from VISA International has arrived in Kyiv to discuss the future steps and conditions of cooperation.
“The expansion of its possibilities in the financial service area, both in towns and rural areas, especially in those corners of the country where no bank operates is a very important issue,” acting Ukrposhta Director General Ihor Tkachuk said.
VISA is one of the largest global payment systems and its cards are accepted in stores in over 200 countries.
KYIV. Sept 18 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Japan’s Fujikura electric wire and telecommunications systems corporation plans to receive EUR 40 million of revenue from an electronic element and wire plant in Lviv region which is being created as part of an investment project, Fujikura Managing Executive Officer Ichiro Kamada said at the presentation of the project in Kyiv on Wednesday.
He said that at the first phase of the realization of the project, which has assessed investment of EUR 5-6 million, will create 300 jobs and will eventually increase the number of employees to 3,000 within the next three years.
“Now we’re to decide for what global automobile manufacturers we will produce goods. We plan to transfer our production facilities from Romania to Ukraine and at the first phase the products will be made at existing facilities with a gross area of 12,000 square meters,” Kamada said.
He said that if the first phase is a success, Fujikura will decide on its expansion and further construction of a plant. He assessed total investment in the project at EUR 60 million for three years.
Ukrainian Economic Development and Trade Minister Aivaras Abromavicius said at the presentation that a month ago Fujikura made the decision to resume the realization of the project on the creation of the plant in Lviv region which was frozen in November 2013 due to political events in Ukraine.
“The arrival of these companies makes us feel optimistic. Those reforms concerning deregulation, improvement of investment climate, reforms of the State Fiscal Service being conducted in our country should be more communicated, as actually along with the DCFTA agreement with the EU other opportunities are opened to create production facilities with the purpose of exports to the EU. If they manage to do everything, they would create jobs and bring investment, and their colleagues, rivals and friends would come to our country and would invest with the purpose of exports to the European market. This investment is an important signal for the government and other foreign investors that reforms bring positive effect,” the minister said.
Kamada said that Fujikura started searching for the location to realize the project in 2011.
“We’ve almost decided to come in 203 and signed the office and production facilities leasing agreement in October and November 2013, but, unfortunately, we had to freeze the project. Now we again decided to come, hoping that nothing bad would happen in Ukraine,” Kamada said.
Fujikura was founded in 1885 in Japan and gradually transformed into an international corporation providing innovation solutions. Its turnover exceeds EUR 5 billion a year.
KYIV. Sept 18 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin at a meeting with South Korea’s Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se urged to make more investments into Ukraine and to liberalize a visa regime for Ukrainians.
“Met with Korean foreign chief, urged [him] to make more investments into Ukraine. Among perspective directions of cooperation are agriculture, IT, education. I proposed the Korean colleague to liberalize visa regime for Ukrainians,” Klimkin wrote on Twitter.
KYIV. Sept 18 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The State Property Fund of Ukraine (SPF) has formed a list of 910 facilities of groups A, D and Z that are eligible for privatization, the fund has said on its website.
“In addition, there are around 30,000 facilities that are not included in the charter capitals [of enterprises], which could be privatized,” Deputy SPF Head Tetiana Burtniak said at a meeting with property market players on Tuesday.
She said that the fund’s website includes information on facilities eligible for privatization which will soon be expanded with photo materials.
“The goal is clear and transparent – we finally want to achieve the sale of the whole number of small privatization facilities, most of which have not found investors for a long period of time,” Deputy SPF Head Natalia Lebed said.
She said that the purchase of state property from SPF has its own advantages compared to the secondary market: fully open information on the facilities, transparent ownership history, postponement of payments for two months, and the possibility of selling it with one bidder.
“Facilities are not sold due to various reasons, but the sale procedures today are clear and transparent, the fund reports on each its privatization step,” Burtniak said.
The participants of the meeting, including the heads of Colliers International, CBRE, the Chamber of Realtors of Ukraine, the Association of Realtors of Ukraine and the Unions of Realtors of Ukraine expressed their readiness to cooperate with the fund and promised to send proposals on their participation in the privatization of small facilities.
DNIPROPETROVSK. Sept 17 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Swedish EcoEnergy Scandinavia could build an enterprise to generate energy from waste with a capacity of 100 MW worth $120 million in Dnipropetrovsk with the help of TMM-Energobud.
An Interfax-Ukraine correspondent has reported that a memorandum on the idea was signed by EcoEnergy Vice President Peter Lindh, Deputy Head of Dnipropetrovsk Regional Administration and Director General of company-contractor TMM-Energobud Mykola Tolmachev.
The regional administration said that the investment center at the administration has offered three land parcels for building the plant, and the project could be finished in three years.
“Real programs that would stimulate businesses to more actively use recycled materials should appear in Ukraine. We would support and develop these investment initiatives at the regional level,” Dnipropetrovsk Regional Administration Head Valentyn Reznichenko said.
“We confirm our full readiness to invest in and realize this project,” head of the representative office of EcoEnergy in Ukraine Valentyn Makohon said.
Experts have said that thanks to construction of the plant, Dnipropetrovsk could save 100 million cubic meters of gas a year.
EcoEnergy Scandinavia AB is a project designer and an independent electricity supply organization. It focuses on Eastern Europe and Russia, and its current projects are focused in Russia, specifically the special economic zone in Kaliningrad region.
KIYV. Sept 17 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The World Bank is ready to provide funds to equip automatic weighting complexes for transport on Ukrainian roads, director of the department of strategic development of road market and transport at the Infrastructure Ministry Roman Khmil has said.
“Around $20 million of initial investment is required for the project, while the pay-back period is very small,” he said in an interview with Interfax-Ukraine.
He said that a total of 200 complexes are required, and judging by experience of other countries, the pay-back period of the complexes would be one year.
“However, then revenues from fines fall sharply and they would hardly cover their functioning as everyone starts sticking to the rules. Nevertheless, the economic effect is UAH 15-20 billion a year, which we lose now in the form of damage caused to roads by those who violate weight requirements. We have to send large funds to repair vehicles after they drive on worn-down roads,” Khmil said.
When asked why the state has not provided funds for these complexes, he said that no one seriously tackled the issue or wanted to take political responsibility for the introduction of unpopular reforms.
He said that financing of the complexes could start from October 2015 when the third credit line from the World Bank could be finally approved.
