Business news from Ukraine

The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine at a meeting on Friday amended the Regulation on the procedure for issuing driver’s licenses and admission of citizens to driving vehicles and the Procedure for state registration and deregistration of vehicles, said the representative of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine in the Verkhovna Rada Taras Melnychuk.

“Introduced the practical examination for the right to drive vehicles of categories A1, A and B1 exclusively on sites for training in initial driving, and category B – exclusively in traffic conditions on routes determined by the territorial service center of the Ministry of Internal Affairs”, – wrote Melnychuk in the Telegram channel.

In addition, the functionality of the driver’s electronic account and the Diya Portal was expanded regarding the possibility of ordering electronically services for state registration and deregistration of vehicles, issuing a temporary registration card in connection with the granting of the right to drive a vehicle to another individual or a vehicle registration certificate funds in the name of another individual traveling abroad, as well as for extending the period of responsible storage of license plates of re-registered or deregistered vehicles for further assignment to other vehicles of the owner, issuing a conclusion on the possibility of applying special individual identification numbers or duplicating the primary ones identification numbers of vehicles, as well as the exchange of a driver’s license produced on a form for a driver’s license in electronic form and vice versa.

Prime Minister of Ukraine Denys Shmygal said that the Cabinet of Ministers approved the draft state budget for 2024 with own general fund revenues of UAH 1 trillion 560 billion and general fund expenditures of UAH 3 trillion 108 billion.

“The key focus of this project is the defense and security of our country. We are directing more than half of all budget resources – 1 trillion 685 billion UAH. This amount is 113 billion UAH more than this year. There will be even more weapons and equipment. More drones, ammunition, missiles. Just like this year, every penny of taxes of citizens and businesses will go to ensure our security and defense forces,” wrote Shmygal in his Telegram channel.

According to the Prime Minister, the second priority is the social sphere, budget expenditures for which will amount to 469 billion UAH, which is 25 billion UAH more than this year.

“The third priority is medicine and education. For the education sector we allocate 179 billion UAH, and this is 23 billion more than in the current year. For medicine – 202 billion UAH, which is 24 billion more than the expenditures of 2023,” he said.

Shmygal noted that the fourth priority is the support of veterans, and we increase spending on this program twice – from 6.8 billion UAH in 2023 to 14.3 billion UAH next year.

“The fifth priority is the recovery of our economy. No tax increases are expected. The government continues programs of preferential lending, the program of non-refundable grants – work, support for Ukrainian startups. We also launch new programs for industrial parks, implementation of investment projects, to support the Ukrainian manufacturer”, – he concluded.

Dniprovsky Metallurgical Plant (DMZ, formerly Dniprokoks), a part of DCH Steel of DCH group of businessman Oleksandr Iaroslavskyi, produced 4.4 thousand tons of rolled products in August this year, having reduced production by 67.4% against the previous month and by 64.7% against August-2022.

According to the company’s press release, the reason for the reduction in volumes was repairs of the main equipment.

At the same time, the plant also produced 25.8 thousand tons of coke in August, while in the previous month – 30.4 thousand tons (down 15.3%).

In total, for the eight months of 2023, rolled metal output amounted to 74.1 thousand tons, which is 80.8% more than in 8M-2022.

Coke output for the first eight months of this year increased by 34% to 198.1 thousand tons.

“In August, rolling shops mainly produced mine stand and channels for the Ukrainian market. Products of coke-chemical production were shipped to metallurgical plants, ferroalloy plants, agro-enterprises, etc.”, – explained in the press release.

It is recalled that DMZ resumed production of rolled products after a three-month downtime in April 2022. Last year, the plant reduced production of rolled products by 74.2% to 58.4 thousand tons compared to 2021, coke – by 56.3% to 211.3 thousand tons.

DMZ specializes in the production of steel, pig iron, rolled steel and products thereof. On March 1, 2018, DCH Group signed an agreement to purchase Dniprovsky Iron and Steel Works from Evraz.