KYIV. July 7 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukraine and the United States are preparing the resumption of launches of Antares modernized launch vehicle from Wallops Flight Facility (Virginia, U.S.) that delivers cargos to the International Space Station (ISS) under the NASA order, Head of the State Space Agency of Ukraine (SSAU) Liubomyr Sabadosh has said.
“According to the information from our U.S. partners, the launch of the Cygnus cargo spacecraft using Antares launch vehicle scheduled for July 6, 2016 has been postponed for August due to technical reasons: partners are finishing the tuning of new RD-181 rocket engines successfully tested in June,” he said.
He recalled that Ukraine is one of the key participants of the Antares program: Pivdenne Design Bureau designed the first stage of the launch vehicle and Pivdenmash made it (both are based in Dnipro).
Early this year Pivdenmash and U.S. Orbital ATK signed a new contract to produce and supply six first stages of Antares launch vehicle for commercial missions of NASA with the option for six more stages. Pivdenmash said that at least two sections of first stages would be delivered in autumn under the contract. Since 2013, eight first stages have been shipped to the U.S. customer under the project, and three of them have not yet been used.
Ukraine and the United States have been cooperating under the Antares program since 2008. Orbital ATK designed the Antares launch vehicle under a contract with NASA worth $1.9 billion.
KYIV. July 7 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukraine in the first half of 2016 fully used quotas for duty free exports of goods to the EU for the nine groups of agricultural products: honey, sugar, cereals and flour, malt and wheat gluten, processed tomatoes, grape and apple juices, oats, wheat, wheat flour and granules, corn, corn flour and granules.
The press service of the Ukrainian Agribusiness Club (UCAB) reported, referring to data from the European Commission, the main quarterly poultry and semi-finished products quota was fully used in the first and second quarter of 2016.
“The following groups are close to the full use of the quota: barley, barley flour and granules (31% used), glucose and glucose syrup (18.8%), off-corn (18.6%), barley (16.4%), starch (8.8%), processed food made of sugar (8.1%), ethanol (4.6%), processed food made of grain (1.9%), food (0.2%) and sweet corn (0.2%),” UCAB said.
Beef, pork, egg and albumin, butter and dairy paste, milk, cream, condensed milk, yoghurt and milk powder quotas were not used for the whole period when the trade part of the EU-Ukraine Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area (DCFTA) Agreement is in effect.
The key reason is that Ukrainian producers do not have European quality certificates.
“Only 12 dairy companies in Ukraine passed certification and were permitted to export dairy products to the EU. The first pilot batch of dairy products was delivered to Bulgaria in late April,” the association said.
Restrictions in trade with Russia caused some logistics difficulties with exports to Russia and Central Asia, and the EU countries play an important role in foreign trade with Ukrainian agricultural products now.
1. Еxcluding the temporarily occupied territories of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, the city of Sevastopol and part of the anti-terrorist operation zone. 2. Volume of Ukraine’s industrial production sold includes data on enterprises that submit summary reports (without breakdown by region).
KYIV. July 6 (Interfax-Ukraine) – One of the largest corporations in Japan, Mitsubishi Corporation, and NIKO Group have created a joint venture MMC Ukraine LLC (Kyiv) with 60% and 40% shares respectively. The company is a new Mitsubishi car distributor in Ukraine.
MMC Ukraine has been a representative of Mitsubishi Motors Corporation in Ukraine and Moldova since May 10, 2016.
Hiroaki Ozawa has been appointed director general of the company.
“Bringing of a new distributor to the Ukrainian market is not only the high-profile event for the Ukrainian automobile market in general, but also the positive indicator for resumption of foreign investment inflow to Ukraine. The new distributor sets an ambitious goal: to occupy 3.5% of the market in 2016,” the company said in a press release.
The company told Interfax-Ukraine that at present, the brand share of the market is 1.63%.
An upward trend in sales and the potential of the SUV segment where most Mitsubishi models are present confirm optimistic prospects on the Ukrainian market.
The Mitsubishi model range of the brand will be presented by new models of this year – Mitsubishi Pajero Sport and Mitsubishi L200, and upgraded Mitsubishi ASX and Mitsubishi Outlander.
“The task of MMC Ukraine is to provide as close as possible cooperation with the manufacturer, adapt the Mitsubishi model range to the specifics of exploitation in Ukraine, provide for quick entrance of new models to the Ukrainian market and provide warranty and post-warranty servicing of cars, delivery spare parts and accessories,” the company said.
The new distributor will also service Mitsubishi cars bought before May 10, 2016.
The company intends to expand its dealer chain. Today it includes 26 centers in 21 cities of Ukraine and one car center in Moldova.
The NIKO Group’s core activity is automotive business (import, distribution, retail sales and service), operations in the financial sector (insurance, leasing, financing and lending, investment and asset management), construction, transport, and customs brokerage services.
The automobile business includes imports and distribution (Mitsubishi Motors and ExxonMobil brands), retail sales (the NIKO dealer chain includes 16 dealer centers of such brands as Mitsubishi, Mazda, Nissan, Citroёn, Peugeot, Ford, Renault, Audi, Fiat, Suzuki and Yamaha).
KYIV. July 6 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The capacity of the berry market in Ukraine is estimated at 190,000-200,000 tonnes, or more than $250-300 million, while its annual growth rate is 2-4%, UkrAgroConsult CEO Serhiy Feofilov has said at a press conference at Interfax-Ukraine.
“The berry market of Ukraine is at the stage of formation. Investment has recently come here. Currently we are on the threshold of a highly liquid berry market in Ukraine,” he said.
According to the expert, over the past few years the area under berry plantations in Ukraine grew by several times, the assortment of berries expanded. At the same time, berry consumption is three or four times less than in Europe.
Manufacturers noted difficulty in exporting fresh berries due to the closure of the Russian market. EU states import mainly frozen berries, but such production in Ukraine is not high enough.
“Almost 90% of my clients believe the Russian market will open. But the market won’t open not because we have bad relations but because very large investments have been made to develop berry fields in Russia. Currants and raspberries grow well in Russia, there are state programs of support,” Director of the Brusviana berry farm Liliana Dmitriyeva said.
She said there are prospects for exports to countries where a hot climate does not allow growing some types of berries.
She stated the government and the Ministry of Agricultural Policy and Food should lobby for the opening of markets for exports of Ukrainian berries and removal of quarantine restrictions in this field.
KYIV. July 6 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukraine in January-May 2016 increased electricity exports by 29.4% compared to the same period in 2015, to 1.863 billion kWh, a source in the Ministry of Energy and Coal Industry has told Interfax-Ukraine.
Electricity supplies from the Burshtyn thermal power plant energy island in the direction of Hungary, Slovakia and Romania for the four months decreased by 9.8% compared to January-May 2015, to 1.294 billion kWh.
Electricity supplies to Poland amounted to 564.945 million kWh, while in January-May 2015 they were not carried out.
In January-May 2016 Moldova was supplied 3.702 million kWh of power, Belarus was not supplied electricity. In January-May 2015 exports to Moldova and Belarus was 3.508 million kWh and 364,000 kWh respectively.
Ukrainian electricity was not exported to Russia in January-May 2015 and January-May 2016.
At the same time, in May 2016 exports of Ukrainian electricity amounted to 282.729 million kWh, which is 3.2% down year-on-year.
In addition, Ukraine in January-May 2016 imported 20.123 million kWh of electricity against 1.390 billion kWh for the five months of 2015.
