The mining and metallurgical group Metinvest intends to receive compensation from Russia for the enterprises destroyed by the war and direct it to the development of Ukrainian assets.
“We should get full compensation for the damage from the Russians and reinvest it in restarting Ukrainian plants,” Metinvest CEO Yury Ryzhenkov said on the air of Ian King Live on Sky News in Britain.
According to him, the company helps Ukraine defend itself against Russian attacks. He also shared the latest news about the current activities of the group’s enterprises and presented a steel bracelet “Azovstal. Symbol of indestructibility”, a joint project with UNITED24 presidential charity platform to raise funds for the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Metinvest’s participation in the project is part of Rinat Akhmetov’s Steel Front militarized initiative.
“From the first days of the full-scale invasion, both of our shareholders (Rinat Akhmetov and Vadim Novinsky) decided that the company should support the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Therefore, in addition to using our equipment to create a defense line, we developed new ways to produce armored steel, which is now used in body armor. We have supplied the Ukrainian Army and Territorial Defense with over 150,000 body armor. We have also developed new steel mobile shelters that can be used in the field to heat and protect the military from shelling,” said the top manager.
In addition, the group purchases and supplies the army with vehicles, armored vehicles, thermal imaging cameras, radios, etc. A large number of vehicles and equipment needed by the Ukrainian defense forces in the field.
Answering the question about what major assets of the company are now operating in Ukraine, the General Director stated that at present the group has two metallurgical plants in Ukraine: one in Zaporizhzhya and the other in Kamensk. Both of them are in operation now and their capacities are about 50-60% loaded. The company may produce armored plates, steel shelters, etc.
As for the group’s foreign assets, they experienced some difficulties at first mainly because they relied on semi-finished products from Azovstal to operate.
“Since then we have diversified our sources of supply of semi-finished products. For example, here in the UK, slabs are now supplied by British Steel, ThyssenKrupp. In Italy it is ADI. We have found different suppliers that can provide the volumes we need,” said the CEO.
According to him, everyone in the U.K. is working under the same conditions. And the steel industry is as competitive as it can be.
“But when it comes to support, and we’re all colleagues, we understand how we can support each other in the industry,” Ryzhenkov said.
Asked about the situation in Mariupol, which is under occupation, he said the group knows little about what is happening in Mariupol right now.
“There are still quite a few people there, but they can’t say much about what’s going on in the city. As far as I understand, the power supply is unstable, there is no water, no heating, there is a humanitarian disaster in the city right now,” the head of the company explained.
And again expressed confidence that there will be compensation for the destroyed plants.
“We are confident that we should receive full compensation for the losses from the Russians and reinvest it in the Ukrainian plants to resume their work,” the top manager summarized.
“Metinvest is a vertically integrated group of mining and metallurgical enterprises. The enterprises of the group are mainly located in Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhia and Dnipropetrovsk regions.
The major shareholders of the holding are SCM Group (71.24%) and Vadim Novinsky’s Smart Holding (23.76%) that manage it jointly.
Metinvest Holding LLC is the management company of Metinvest Group.
COMPENSATION, DEVELOPMENT, METINVEST, RUSSIAN FEDERATION, Ukrainian plants
The Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine has issued 57 orders granting grants to agricultural producers to establish orchards and build greenhouses for the total UAH 277.2 million.
According to the agency’s website on Friday, the grants to farmers range from 360 thousand UAH to 10 million UAH per recipient, the total area of future plantations and under greenhouses is 257.44 ha.
The Ministry also clarified that 52 of the 57 grants for the total amount of 242.2 million UAH will be allocated for planting gardens, and five grants for the total amount of 35 million UAH will be given for the construction of greenhouses. The participants of the greenhouses projects are farmers from Dnipropetrovsk, Zakarpattya, Odessa and Vinnytsia regions, the total area of the constructions will be 8.9 hectares.
Ministry of Agrarian Policy reminded that on November 15 the Cabinet of Ministers made a number of clarifications to the procedure for providing grants for the establishment or development of horticulture, berry growing and viticulture. In particular, grants are now available for the construction of modular greenhouses of at least 0.4 ha and not more than 2.4 ha in size according to the standard project and the number of new jobs created of at least 14 per 1 ha of greenhouse area. It is also possible to receive funds for the purchase of means of production (planting material, seeds, technological equipment), covering the costs of their delivery and commissioning the modular greenhouse.
There are set grant limits depending on the area of a modular greenhouse: for buildings 0,4-0,6 ha it shall not exceed 2 mln UAH, for constructions 0,8-1,2 ha – 3,5 mln UAH, for 1,6-2,4 ha – 7 mln UAH.
As it was reported, grants for greenhouses development allow agribusinesses to attract up to UAH 7 million of financing, and for gardening – up to UAH 10 million. In general, the state will allocate 16 billion UAH to finance such projects.
DEVELOPMENT, GRANTS, HORTICULTURE, MINISTRY OF AGRARIAN POLICY
Since the beginning, Datagroup-Volia has invested UAH 500 million in the purchase and installation of new equipment, the opening of a new data processing center (DPC) and other areas of the company’s development, its CEO Mikhail Shelemba said at a press conference on Wednesday .
“We launched a new data center on 300 sq. m. We launched it both for our customers and for the needs of the company’s modernization. There is a lot of new equipment that was placed in this center,” Shelemba said.
According to him, the center has a total area of 300 square meters, 103 telecommunication cabinets, 4,326 RU (resource units), two power inputs of 1 MW each and three standby diesel power plants of 800 kW, as well as a system of modular uninterruptible power supplies.
In addition to the new data center, Datagroup-Volia invested in the installation of more than 200 units of new equipment, laying 34 thousand km of fiber-optic network, and also opened its own international crossings to Poland, Germany and Slovakia, increasing the network throughput up to 4 Tbps and the capacity of backup links by 10 times.
Separately, Shelemba noted that since the beginning of the full-scale invasion of Russia, the company has joined initiatives to help the Armed Forces of Ukraine and the population, in particular, connected 60 schools and humanitarian centers to free Internet, 440 bomb shelters in 18 regions of the country, and also committed to provide for 50 orphans war before they come of age.
In June 2021, Datagroup, a provider of fiber-optic infrastructure and digital services, completed the signing of an agreement to acquire 100% of the Ukrainian provider of pay TV and cable high-speed Internet access services of the Volia group of companies, and now they are developing as a consolidated asset.
The Fund for Reconstruction and Development of Ukraine, together with the Kontramarka Help project, plans to create a rehabilitation center for civilians and military personnel in western Ukraine, and later in other regions, president of the fund Artem Honcharenko has said.
“One of the projects that will be implemented by the Fund for Reconstruction and Development of Ukraine together with Kontarmarka Help is the creation of a rehabilitation center for civilian and military people. We plan to create it in the western region, and then scale it all over Ukraine,” Honcharenko said during press conference at Interfax-Ukraine on Thursday.
According to him, the center will provide assistance in physical and psychological rehabilitation, reintegration into civilian life, and job search.
“We have been seeing this problem since 2014, when combatants were not particularly actively recruited. Now there will be even more such people, so the problem needs to be solved in the near future,” he said.
The Fund for Reconstruction and Development of Ukraine (https://rdua.eu/) was established in April 2022 at the initiative of the International Technology Transfer Association and the I-Dolina start-up platform to organize and deliver humanitarian aid to Ukraine.
ARTEM HONCHARENKO, DEVELOPMENT, FUND, RECONSTRUCTION, REHABILITATION CENTER
Nova Poshta Group plans to invest UAH 5 billion in development in 2022, of which UAH 1.2 billion into an innovative terminal in Odesa.
As Nova Poshta said in a report on Wednesday, the terminal in Odesa will become the company’s second largest sorting facility after its opening.
Construction work at the Odesa terminal began in June last year. The terminal will consist of two buildings – postal and freight, their total area – more than 26,000 square meters.
Active construction is currently underway: a building frame is being assembled at the cargo terminal.
“In 2022, we plan to invest unprecedented UAH 5 billion in the Nova Poshta development: in terminal infrastructure; a network of branches and post offices; in innovation. This is one and a half times more than last year. We believe in our country, we believe in its people, so we continue to develop our business and work with inspiration,” co-owner of Nova Poshta Volodymyr Popereshniuk is quoted in the report.
In March, the installation of automated equipment will begin at the terminal. These will be two main automated Vanderlande lines for sorting parcels from 2 kg to 30 kg and three lines for sorting small parcels manufactured by the Ukrainian company Konsort.
In addition, telescopic conveyors will be installed at the terminal, which drive directly into the car body and help automate the process of loading. A total of 48 such “telescopes” are planned to be installed at the terminal.
It is planned to use 50 robotic carts at the cargo part of the terminal: robots manufactured by Ukrainian SBR for moving cargo.
The terminal will begin operation, tentatively, already in November of this year. It will be able to process up to 40,000 parcels per hour, which is three times more the speed of the current terminal.
The terminal will sort the parcels for Odesa and 65 settlements of Odesa region. It will create more than 700 new jobs.
The company also said that they planned to open an automated terminal in Zaporizhia the following week.
The Nova Poshta group of companies includes, in particular, Nova Poshta, NP Logistic, NovaPay and Nova Poshta Global companies.
