The volume of trade between Ukraine and Russia has dropped by nearly 84% over the past six years, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said at a joint press conference with European Commission Vice-President for Interinstitutional Relations and Foresight Maros Sefcovic in Kyiv.
“In fact, the volume of annual trade from Russia has dropped over the past six years by nearly 84%, from $37 billion to $7 billion. Trade turnover between Russia and Ukraine is gradually declining. At the same time, the volume of trade [between Ukraine and] Europe has grown to over 40%, which means it has grown by more than fivefold. The replacement of markets is underway, and Ukraine is learning to manufacture goods of higher quality, in line with European standards, which meets the course of our development,” Shmyhal said, when asked by Interfax-Ukraine what share of Ukrainian exports has been affected by Russia’s recently-introduced ban on imports of certain products from Ukraine and how the Ukrainian government would respond to it.
Shmyhal insisted that he was talking not about “trade wars” but about the Ukrainian market’s natural reorientation toward the European and other markets.
As was reported earlier, the Russian government extended a list of products that cannot be imported from Ukraine on June 28, 2021.
The volume of the e-commerce market in Ukraine in 2020 grew by 41% and reached $4 billion, which is 8.8% of the total retail trade, follows from a study by Soul Partners, Baker Tilly Ukraine and Aequo with the support of USAID.
According to the study, the Ukrainian e-commerce market has tripled in the past five years and has the potential to double in the next five years.
According to the material, the share of e-commerce in Ukraine’s GDP is 2.6%. At the same time, Ukraine has a low level of spending on e-commerce per year in comparison with other countries – about $104, which is explained by the low purchasing power of the population.
The most developed sectors of e-commerce in Ukraine are electronics and clothing, but every year the share of electronics is decreasing due to the growth of other categories, the study notes.
Thus, the volume of e-commerce in clothing over 2020 amounted to $291 million, the share of online sales in the structure of retail trade in clothing was 6.8%. According to the forecast, this figure will reach 10% by 2023. The most visited online clothing stores in 2020 were Shafa (105.1 million visits), Klubok (35.1 million) and Kloomba (34.9%).
According to the research, food has become a relatively new category with a significant growth potential in the Ukrainian e-commerce market, which also includes ready-to-eat food delivery services. Thus, the volume of e-commerce in products last year amounted to UAH 150 million.
The volume of e-commerce of furniture in Ukraine last year amounted to $69 million and occupied 9.2% in the structure of retail trade. This category of trade is forecast to grow 1.7 times over the next three years. The most visited online stores last year were Jysk (18.2 million), Taburetka (8.6 million) and MebelOk (6.7 million).
Most of the purchases on the Internet are made by Ukrainians on marketplaces (63%), the rest – in specialized online stores. The largest marketplaces in Ukraine are Rozetka, Prom, Allo, Bigl and Epicentr.
The initial registrations of electric vehicles in Ukraine (new and used) in May 2021 decreased by almost 36% compared to May last year, to 622 units, including registrations of cars decreased by almost 36%, to 590 units, and commercial grew by 14%, to 32 units, according to the Ukrautoprom association.
According to a post on its website, the share of new electric cars in total registrations accounted for 11% (67 units).
The total number of registered passenger cars is 66 new and 524 used, and there is only one new commercial vehicle.
Compared to April this year, registrations in May decreased by 11%.
The most popular electric car in May was once again the Nissan Leaf with 186 cars of this model that received Ukrainian registration (in April – 198).
As reported, Nissan Motor Ukraine, the official distributor of Nissan in Ukraine, announced the start of official sales in Ukraine in the summer of the updated Nissan Leaf (before that, only used ones were imported to Ukraine), and in May announced that in the offered rich configuration N-Connecta the price starts from UAH 976,490.
The second result in May 2021 was shown by Tesla Model 3 with 66 registrations, and the third was AUDI E-Tron (33 registrations). The fourth most popular was Tesla Model S with 32 registrations, and Chevrolet Bolt closes the top five of the May electric car market with 29 cars.
The most popular commercial electric vehicle remains the Renault Kangoo Z.E. with 24 registrations.
According to the association, in January-May, a little more than 3,000 electric vehicles passed the first registration in Ukraine, which is 12% more than in the same period in 2020, with 90% of them being used.
In particular, registrations of new cars increased by 36.5% versus January-May 2020, to 299 units, used ones – by almost 10%, to 2,716 units.
It is planned to open 16 business centers with a total area of 376,000 square meters in Kyiv in 2021-2022, Managing Partner of CBRE Ukraine Radomyr Tsurkan told Interfax-Ukraine during the forum devoted to current trends in real estate on Wednesday.
“The collapse of the offices that scared everyone at the start of the pandemic did not take place. According to a study conducted by CBRE in 2020, 73% of those surveyed want to return to the office and have a hybrid work format,” Tsurkan said.
As a result, active construction of new projects and entry of new office space into the market is seen. In particular, in the first quarter of 2021, the new supply amounted to 22,000 square meters.
“Now the vacancy rate is about 14%, this is a fairly healthy indicator. The rates have dropped slightly – by 10% compared to 2020 and total $25 per square meters a month,” Tsurkan said.
According to CBRE Ukraine, in 2021, 12 business centers with a total area of 207,000 square meters are being prepared for going live.
In 2022, it is possible to replenish the office real estate market with four facilities with a total area of 169,000 square meters.
Among the trends in the office real estate market, the expert named changes in formats. “Now everyone understands: a large business center must have a coworking space. Another innovation that we will see soon is a mandatory area for conversations, meetings with visitors on the ground floor and/or in the office itself. This is a safety requirement, including epidemiological,” Tsurkan said.
The Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine (AMCU) has begun collecting information and studying the electric car charging market, the committee said on its website.
It notes the intensive growth of the electric car market in recent years, while the market for commercial charging stations is also growing. In this regard, the AMCU starts monitoring it in order to control compliance with the legislation on the protection of economic competition.
“The purpose of this control is to determine the state of the competitive environment in the market and its assessment; to identify and determine the problems in the market that hinder the development of competition; to ensure compliance with legislation on the protection of economic competition; to prepare, if necessary, based on the results of such control, proposals for the implementation of measures aimed to develop competition,” the committee notes.
The AMCU called on current and potential market participants to provide information and considerations on possible economic, organizational, administrative and technical barriers that may prevent new companies from competing in the electric vehicle charging market.
As reported, Minister of Infrastructure Vladyslav Krykliy said in November 2020 that Ukraine supports the use of ecological modes of transport in cities, therefore, as part of the National Transport Strategy until 2030, it plans to completely replace all urban public transport with electric one and create the appropriate infrastructure for this.
FREE REGISTATION
DATE & TIME:
December 10, 09:30 – 11:00 GMT
TOPICS AND QUESTIONS TO BE DISCUSSED:
Green Hydrogen is having a moment around the world. Now new players are entering the market:
The Georgian government has recently asked the EBRD to explore the country’s potential for generating green hydrogen which could then be blended and transported to end-users through existing gas pipelines.
Ukraine has the potential for substantial hydrogen production – it is estimated that approximately 505,133 million m3 of green hydrogen could be produced in Ukraine annually. Various hydrogen-related projects are starting to be unveiled in the country.
AMONG CONFIRMED SPEAKERS:
– Aleksandr Riepkin, President, Ukrainian Hydrogen Council
– Daniel Potash, Chief of Party, USAID Energy Program
– David Managadze, Associate Director, Regional Head – Caucasus, Energy Eurasia, EBRD
– Jorgo Chatzimarkakis, Secretary-General, Hydrogen Europe
You can learn more on the event’s official website: https://www.investinnet.com/energy-talks/ or contact the organisers: info@investinnet.com
Open4Business is an official information partner of the event.
