The industrial community of Ukraine is against ordering 16 modern Mark VI patrol boats and the equipment they need for $600 million from the United States, the press service of the Ukrainian League of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (ULIE) has said.
“The main duty of the authorities is to take care of the economic development of their own country, filling their own state budget, creating jobs at home. The orders in question only contribute to the growth of foreign budgets and stabilize the situation with employment in other states and do not help overcome crisis in our country. This is unacceptable and irresponsible,” the ULIE President, the chairman of the Anti-Crisis Council of Public Organizations, Anatoliy Kinakh, said.
In addition to ordering boats, industrialists pay attention to the purchase of imported locomotives and helicopters, which, in their opinion, could threaten serious socio-economic consequences for the whole country.
Kinakh emphasized that Ukraine has its own shipbuilding industry – highly professional production facilities, including in Mykolaiv, which are capable of building modern military boats and other small tonnage ships with a certain modernization.
“At this difficult time, the responsible government must develop both a national strategy for industrial and innovative development, and separate programs for shipbuilding, other priority areas of industry, to use all the levers to support the complex high-tech industry, starting from manufacturers’ access to credit resources, mitigating fiscal burden, changes in public procurement that would allow attracting public finances to load national producers,” he said.
Some 46.1% of Ukrainians believe that the country should strive to join the European Union, 13.1% in the Eurasian Economic Union, while 28.3% do not want Ukraine to join any economic alliances.
Those are the results of a survey conducted by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) from April 26 to April 30 and presented at the Interfax-Ukraine agency.
Survey results show 41.9% of Ukrainians believe that Ukraine should strive to be a NATO member, 34.7% – a neutral state and 12% – a member of the Collective Security Treaty Organization.
If offered U.S. or EU citizenship, 27.1% said they would leave the country to live there, while 65.1% would remain in Ukraine. Only 6.3% said they would leave for Russia. Some 86.3% said they would refuse to relocate to Russia. Offered a “bonus” of $100,000, 11.2% of respondents said they would move there.
The KIIS survey was conducted from April 26 to April 30, 2020 using the CATI method (computer-assisted telephone interviews) based on a random selection of mobile phone numbers. Some 1,500 interviews were included in the survey.
The sample is representative of the adult population of Ukraine (aged 18 years and older). It does not include Russia-occupied areas in Donbas and Crimea. The statistical error of the sample (with a probability of 0.95 and without taking into account the design effect) does not exceed 2.6% for indicators close to 50%, 2.2% for indicators close to 25%, 1.7% for indicators close to 10% and 1.1% – for indicators close to 5%.
Ukraine counts on $10 billion of financial support from various financial institutions in 2020, said Prime Minister of Ukraine Denys Shmyhal. “All these funds … Their volume this year exceeds $10 billion of financial support from various financial institutions, international financial organizations – the IMF, European bodies, the EU and partner countries,” he said during an hour of questions to the government in parliament on Wednesday.
At the same time, Shmyhal noted that most often the allocation of finance depends on the agreement of Ukraine with the International Monetary Fund.
“Therefore, it is very important that we move forward and receive these funds, so that next year we will have a 7% increase without rolling into the abyss and being not able to get out of it for another ten years,” added Shmyhal.
Kyiv Sikorsky International Airport has asked the president of Ukraine, the prime minister, the Minister of Infrastructure and the mayor of Kyiv to take a number of measures aimed at providing assistance for its maintenance in connection with quarantine. The corresponding appeal of Kyiv International Airport and Master Avia LLC was posted on the airport’s website.
The authorities, in particular, are asked to provide financial assistance in the amount of UAH 22 million per month for the payment of salaries to employees and to maintain the airfield and the airport in working condition for the period when it stopped working and quarantine is over until a passenger flow reaches 20,000 passengers per month for departure.
It also asks to remove restrictions for Kyiv Airport in terms of performing flights during the suspension of flights, because, as the company explains, at present, preferences for the operation of transport, business aviation and evacuation flights are provided exclusively to Boryspil airport.
They also ask to allocate a targeted subsidy of $15 per passenger to provide discounts to airlines for a period of 1.5-2 years for the resumption of passenger traffic, provide assistance in refinancing a loan in the amount of $28 million at a minimum interest rate and with a long-term maturity, provide land tax benefits for Master Avia LLC and Kyiv International Airport, create a commission to support the aviation industry with the participation of representatives of Master Avia LLC and Kyiv International Airport.
Representatives of the shopping center development market of Ukraine have sent an open letter to authorities asking to start a dialog on consolidation of actions to prevent the spread of the coronavirus disease COVID-19 and taking steps aimed at reviving business activities after the end of quarantine.
“The shopping centers and the companies that are represented in them are among the largest taxpayers. However, today they are most affected by quarantine, because understanding the responsibility and gravity of the situation visitors have limited access to malls. Developers faithfully and promptly complied with the decision of Cabinet of Ministers No. 210 on preventing the spread of COVID-19 in Ukraine,” they said in a collective letter sent on March 30, the text of which is available for Interfax-Ukraine.
In the letter, the developers drew attention to the need: to harmonize the content of the local protocols of the standing commissions of the fuel and energy complex and the emergency response with the resolution of the Cabinet of Ministers; allow the sale of textile masks in malls; provide the opportunity to use public transport for employees of permitted groups of tenants; reduce the amount of VAT and defer the payment of income tax for three months after the end of quarantine; exempt from land fees, real estate tax and income tax; confirm holidays for bank loans; to keep the obligatory payment by the tenants for maintaining malls.
The letter is addressed to the President of Ukraine, Verkhovna Rada, National Bank of Ukraine, Kyiv City Administration, the Bar Association and the European Business Association.
The document was signed by CEETRUS Ukraine Commercial Director Ganna Koryagina, Dragon Capital Property Management Commercial Director Nataliya Kravets, Arricano CEO Anna Chubotina, Chief Operation Officer of Budhouse Group Maksym Havriushyn, CEO of New Business Views (Odesa-based Riviera Shopping City mall) Andriy Brynzylo, representative of Terkury-2 (Podoliany mall in Ternopil) Mykhailo Ibrahimov, Operational Director of Davento Ukraine (network of the Equator shopping centers) Larysa Pervinenko, director of Smena (Hollywood shopping center in Chernihiv) Ruslan Zemliansky, and Commercial Director of Urban Oasis Center Ludmyla Vilischuk.
In November, the German-Ukrainian Fund (GUF) will present a new FinancEast program to support micro–, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) in the government-controlled territories of Donetsk and Luhansk regions, under which it is planned to reimburse up to 50% of the cost of investment projects of enterprises, GUF Executive Director Valeriy Mayboroda has said.
“This program is also co-financed by the EU and its amount is EUR9.5 million,” Country Manager to Ukraine of the KfW Development Bank Kurt Strasser said at a GUF press event in Kyiv on Wednesday.
According to him, these will be subsidies to help medium- and small-sized enterprises that lack access to money over the difficult economic situation, as well as those who are located in the Donbas region.
The FinancEast program is co-financed by the EU through KfW, the GUF Executive Director said.
“The stage of the finalization of contracts and operational guidelines is nearing completion, and from November we will begin the active phase of its implementation,” Mayboroda said.
FinancEast materials indicate that investment projects for MSMEs are medium- and long-term ones for more than 12 months that are related to the purchase, modernization or reconstruction of fixed assets. Under an investment project, financing of current assets up to 20% of its value is allowed.
In 2019, the assets of a current program for lending SMEs in the national currency, which is designed until 2030, grew to EUR14.7 million, or 47%, since the launch of the project in 2017. This program is implemented by the GUF and financed by KfW and the EU.
Since the beginning of the project, 217 enterprises have been funded for a total of about UAH 710 million with an initial budget of the program being UAH 370 million. The average rate is 15.5% per annum. According to Mayboroda, the financial resource of the program was used twice due to the reuse of returned loans.
Partners under the GUF’s program are Kredobank, Ukrgasbank, ProCredit Bank and Bank Lviv. The GUF’s Executive Director said that negotiations with CreditWest Bank were also ongoing on its joining the program.
