Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told about plans to invest at least $20 billion in infrastructure of Ukraine at the Ukrainian-Turkish business forum in Istanbul on Thursday. He also said that in the next five years, the Ukrainian economy will grow by 5-7% annually.
“Over this time, we will invest at least $20 billion in our infrastructure to repair our 24,000 km of roads, to increase the number of operating airports to 15, to develop 5 seaports, to substantially increase their capacity, to triple the capacity of our military-industrial complex,” the president said.
He also said that during this period the country will pay much attention to the development of a high-quality telecommunications sector and promised to support the lifecell mobile communications operator (the subsidiary of Turkey’s Turkcell).
“We will conduct large-scale privatization and sell hundreds of interesting objects to effective investors, create normal competitive rules in the energy markets and simplify the rules of doing business removing restrictions in the areas of labor relations and capital flow,” Zelensky said.
UDP Renewables, a part of UFuture Investment Group, has launched its new solar power plant Scythia-Solar-2 in Melitopol (Zaporizhia region).
“UFuture and UDP Renewables continue to consistently realize the economic potential of Ukraine’s southern region following our long-term energy strategy. Now, the share of renewable energy sources in our country’s energy mix is only about 3%, but together we work towards changing this ratio. Our target is more than 160 MW of total production capacity by the end of 2019,” Founder of UFuture, Vasyl Khmelnytsky, said.
Scythia-Solar-2, with a peak capacity of 33.1 MW, occupies land area of 50 ha and consists of more than 91,000 solar modules produced by JA Solar. New PV PP will generate almost 42,000 MWh per year enabling to power 13,300 households.
“Scythia-Solar-2 is a high-tech facility. It is the second phase of our largest project Scythia-Solar, which we have started implementing in 2018. We have traditionally cooperated with Ukrainian equipment manufacturers and providers of respective services worth of UAH 288.5 million. During different stages of PV PP’s construction and operation, we created 315 jobs,” Managing Partner of UDP Renewables, Sergiy Yevtushenko, emphasized.
The project attracted €21.58 million of investments. The total capacity of two phases of Scythia-Solar is 46 MW, and the total investment reached €31.68 million. The launch of Scythia-Solar-2, instead of coal-fired power plants, will prevent 51 thousand tons of carbon dioxide emissions per year. Its general contractor is a Ukrainian group of companies, KNESS, and the financial partner is Oschadbank.
UDP Renewables is an investment and development company in the Ukrainian renewable energy sector. With diversification in type of renewable power generation and geography, by 2022 UDP Renewables strives to become one of the largest producers of clean energy in Ukraine, with total capacity of more than 300 MW. UDP Renewables is a part of UFuture Investment Group, a Ukrainian private equity firm and group of companies based in Kyiv. It unites businesses and social projects of Ukrainian entrepreneur Vasyl Khmelnytsky. Throughout its 20-year history, the group has accumulated a diversified portfolio of assets that spans both traditional sectors and industries of the future, and ranges from real estate, infrastructure and manufacturing to pharmaceuticals, renewable energy and technology.
INVEST, MELITOPOL, SOLAR POWER PLANT, UDP, VASYL KHMELNYTSKY
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky at a meeting with the Mexican businessman, CEO of Principal Standard Group Peter Foyo has stated that he was ready to support establishment of cooperation between his company and Ukraine if it could help provide Ukrainian state or private enterprises with contracts.
“We are open to everything that creates new business in Ukraine and jobs for our citizens,” Zelensky said, noting that he considers any investment project important, regardless of whether it is an investment of a million or a billion.
According to the presidential press service, at a meeting with Foyo and his partner, Vice President of UTG (Ukrainian Trade Guild) Ihor Melnyk, Zelensky stressed that the state is ready to protect “any clean, real investment in Ukraine.”
The president said that, despite rather busy work schedule, he is always ready to find time for projects useful for Ukraine and sit down at the negotiating table for a substantive conversation.
Foyo, in turn, thanked for the meeting and noted that it was a great honor for him to be in Ukraine, since his wife is Ukrainian and he lives with his family in Mexico and in Ukraine.
The businessman said his specialization is telephony and telecommunications services, which is relevant in the context of development of mobile communications in Ukraine and preparations for the launch of 5G. He said the position of President Zelensky on building constructive cooperation on the principles of openness was important for him.
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky has appealed to foreign investors to invest in Ukraine.Zelensky posted the corresponding video on his Facebook page on Thursday.
So, Zelensky said that it is necessary to carry out a series of reforms that would contribute to the economic growth of the country.
“We need to change a lot here: fire non-professionals and hire professionals, deregulate industries, simplify rules, improve the infrastructure and many other things. As you know, changes take time … I invite you, investors, from any part of the world to join the opportunity,” Zelensky addressed investors in the English language.
Ukraine’s Ministry of Economic Development and Trade estimates the need for investment in a project to develop production capacity of the Novokostiantynivske uranium ore deposit (SE VostGOK, also SkhidGZK) in Kirovohrad region at UAH 2.9 billion, including UAH 1.2 billion from the national budget and another UAH 1.7 billion are the enterprise’s own funds.
According to the ministry’s press release, VostGOK had already allocated UAH 0.35 billion under the project as of January 1, 2019.
The ministry expects that the project will increase the production of uranium concentrate from the raw materials mined at the field by 2.1 times, from 336 tonnes in 2018 to 701 tonnes in 2021. It will also let create 200 new jobs.
DTEK Oil&Gas, responsible for oil and gas segment in the DTEK Group, after signing a product sharing agreement (PSA) for the Zinkivska field (Poltava region) will invest UAH 1.2 billion in its exploration and development, the company’s press service has reported.
DTEK plans to re-process and re-interpret data from previously conducted seismic surveys and gas-dynamic well surveys, 3D surveys, and drill three cat wells in this area. The planned start of production is the second year since the start of work.
As reported, on July 1, the intergovernmental commission on PSA prepared proposals for the winners of nine continental fossil fuel fields put up for competition for the Cabinet of Ministers. The conclusions of the commission are advisory in nature. The final decision is to be made by the government, which must approve the results of the competition by the adoption of relevant documents.
