KYIV. Dec 17 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) in 2015 implemented 130 projects worth more than EUR1.5 million under the program of advisory support to small and medium businesses in Ukraine, Small Business Support National Program Manager at EBRD Ekaterina Rigg has said.
“This year more than EUR1.5 million has been granted to small and medium businesses… We plan to double [the figure in 2016],” she said at a press conference.
Rigg stressed that the number of projects and the size of grants planned for 2016 would be determined within a month after the analysis of the availability of donor resources provided by the European Union, the governments of Sweden and the United States.
According to her, the increase in support for small businesses is due to the constant rise in the number of applications from companies. The particularly relevant is the program of promoting exports to the markets of the EU, the United States, Canada, and the Middle East. Today companies often need help in the development of export strategy, market research, quality management systems, the development of high-quality online portals in foreign languages.
KYIV. Dec 17 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukraine and Turkey will intensify the negotiations on the signing of the free trade zone agreement with the next round of the negotiations scheduled for early 2016 in Turkey.
The Ukrainian and Turkish delegations reached the agreement at the meeting during the 10th conference of WTO ministries in Nairobi (Kenya), Deputy Minister of Economic Development and Trade, Trade Representative of Ukraine Natalia Mykolska has said.
“Yesterday a meeting with the delegation from Turkey was held. It is not a secret for anyone that now our relations are being reloaded. This concerns both trade and investment,” she wrote on her Facebook page on Wednesday.
Mykolska said that the sides agreed to hold a meeting of the interagency commission in the first quarter of 2016 and try not to apply restrictive measures, and discuss the proposals to increase goods turnover and investment projects in the agricultural sector, aviation and IT at the expert level.
“We’ve discussed many issues from increasing exports of rolled metal and grain and oilseeds to cooperation in the area of soap operas,” she said.
KYIV. Dec 17 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Canada’s Bombardier engineering company continues studying the possibility of operating in Ukraine, Infrastructure Minister of Ukraine Andriy Pyvovarsky has told reporters.
“A fundamental decision to invest in Ukraine was made in offices of large western engineering companies,” he said on Wednesday.
Asked if Siemens is planning to enter Ukraine, the minister said that the negotiations are underway.
First Deputy Minister Volodymyr Shulmeister said that representatives of Bombardier visited Zaporizhia Electric Locomotive Repair Plant.
Pyvovarsky also said that the process of creating a JV between Skoda and Zaporizhia Electric Locomotive Repair Plant has been suspended.
As reported, in September 2015, Pyvovarsky said that the Infrastructure Ministry is holding negotiations with Bombardier on potential possibility of starting production of locomotives in Ukraine.
Bombardier manufactures planes, trains and trams. Its key divisions are Bombardier Transportation and Bombardier Aerospace.
KYIV. Dec 16 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The United States will provide $4-5 million for around 40 Ukrainians to study in U.S. business schools in 2016-2017, U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt has said.
This is a part of U.S. investment in Ukraine’s success and this is a part of U.S. liabilities to work with Ukraine to increase human capital of Ukraine, he said at a press conference in Kyiv on Tuesday.
President of Western NIS Enterprise Fund (WNISEF) Jaroslawa Z. Johnson said that the grant program is unique for Ukraine, as her fund will compensate 100% of the tuition in one of 50 the most prestigious universities in the United States.
WNISEF SEED Grant program manager in Ukraine Roman Tychkivsky said that the obligatory condition for participating in the program is the return of the student to Ukraine after the study. He said that the study grant for each student is $100,000. Since 2014 when the program was launched, five Ukrainians used the opportunity of studying in the United States.
KYIV. Dec 16 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The most important industrial sectors for the Ukrainian economy are metal, engineering and light industry, Derzhzovnishinform state enterprise said in a press release based on the study of strategic raw material resources for Ukraine’s development until 2020 conducted by Derzhzovnishinform and the Association for Energy Saving and Energy Efficiency.
The leader is the metal sector, as the country is among top ten largest steel smelters in the world.
Engineering is second thanks to the potential of engineering enterprises and light industry is third.
Coal and gas are among strategically important exhaustible resources in Ukraine (82% of experts polled).
According to the document, before the hostilities Ukraine was among largest anthracite producers in the world. In January-September 2015 Ukraine produced 23.62 million tonnes of steam coal, which is 40% down year-over-year, and exports fell to almost a zero.
Some 86% of respondents said that among exhaustible resources scrap metal is the main strategic resource.
Exports of scrap metal are permanently growing: almost 1.175 million tonnes of scrap metal was exported in January-November 2015, while in 2014 – 1.03 million tonnes was exported. Imports of scrap metals are falling: in 2013 232,700 tonnes was exported, while in January-October 2015 – around 2,000 tonnes.
KYIV. Dec 16 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Bookmakers, to obtain a license to operate in the Internet, in addition to a license for betting rights, will need to obtain at least 100 licenses for opening betting offices.
Such a provision is contained in bill No. 3632 on withdrawing the gambling market from the “shadow” and providing the budget with revenues to fulfill social obligations, the text of which has been posted on the website of the parliament.
According to the document, for licensing their activities betting companies must obtain two types of licenses: one for betting activities, the second one for opening betting offices. The annual fee for the first license will be EUR1 million, its duration is five years. The license for each betting office will cost EUR1,500 to EUR3,000 depending on the number of inhabitants in the settlement, while its validity is limited to the duration of the license for betting activities.
