Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has signed into law a bill amending a number of Ukrainian legislative acts on the conditions for the turnover of farmland, which the Verkhovna Rada passed on March 31, 2020.
“The document provides for the formation of a legislative framework for introducing market-based turnover of farmland. The law signed by the president will empower citizens to exercise their constitutional rights to freely dispose their property and will provide for transparent terms for acquiring ownership of agricultural plots of land by citizens of Ukraine,” the president’s press service said on Tuesday.
Retail goods turnover in Ukraine in March 2020 slowed to 6.1% year-over-year in comparable prices, the State Statistics Service has reported.
In January-March 2020 compared with January-March 2019, retail trade turnover decreased 10.6%, while in March 2020 compared to February 2020 it increased by 4.4%.
The largest increase in the retail turnover of enterprises (legal entities and private entrepreneurs) in March 2020 compared with March 2019 was recorded in Kyiv (by 15.3%), Dnipropetrovsk (by 15%), Kharkiv (by 14.9%), Zaporizhia (by 14.8%), Kirovohrad (by 13.9%), Poltava (by 12.8%), Volyn (by 12.6%) and Odesa (by 12.4%) regions.
The Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine together with the relevant committee of the Verkhovna Rada are working on the preparation of a tax reform for the IT industry, which provides for the establishment of a single tax at the level of 4-7% of the companies’ turnover. Deputy Minister of Digital Transformation Oleksandr Bornyakov gave this information on his Facebook page.
“We propose discussing a single tax for legal entities without a turnover limit and setting it at 4-7%… According to this regime, a legal entity-exporter of services will pay a single tax and will be a tax agent for an employee, paying two single social security contributions and a military tax,” Bornyakov said.
He also said that the following requirements for those who join this taxation regime are being discussed: staff of more than 10 employees; the share of exports in profit and the share of the salary fund in the cost of production being more than 75%; and the average salary being at least five minimum wages.
According to the Ministry of Digital Transformation, this will create legal working environment for the industry, make it more attractive for investment, creating a transparent and understandable corporate structure. In addition, this will create equal competitive working conditions in the industry, as well as conditions for the export of other services.
“At the same time, the model preserves the mechanism for ensuring social guarantees for employees and does not increase the tax burden and administration. After all, on the one hand, tax and reporting are introduced for IT companies, and on the other, we cancel a number of taxes for employees,” the deputy minister said.
He also cited statistics according to which in the first half of 2019, according to the Ministry of Digital Transformation, 158,000 IT private entrepreneurs with income of UAH 52.3 billion worked in Ukraine. At the same time, in Ukraine, there are only about 60,000 officially employed employees of IT companies, whose payroll amounted to about UAH 6.5 billion in the first half of last year.
“And no, we are not sure that this is the only right decision. But, after spending hours of analysis, we consider it to be the best idea that will literally create an industry where not 200,000 legally unrelated private entrepreneurs will work, but fully-featured transparent companies,” Bornyakov said.
He also recalled that the previously formulated idea to create a fifth group of private entrepreneurs for IT specialists was criticized because it violated the principles of equality of taxpayers and did not eliminate any risks in the system.
As reported, previously a group of 20 deputies of the Servant of the People parliamentary faction proposed to the parliament to exempt startups from taxes for a period of nine months from the moment of their registration, making appropriate changes to the Tax Code of Ukraine.
For this purpose, it was planned to introduce an additional fifth single tax group, which will include startups using exclusively cash registers and/or cash settlement software and which income during the first nine months of activity does not exceed UAH 300,000.
Retail trade turnover in Ukraine (legal entities and individual entrepreneurs) in January-September 2019 in comparable prices increased by 9.8% compared with January-September 2018, the State Statistics Service has said.
According to the report, in September 2019 compared with the previous month, retail trade turnover decreased by 3.3%, in annual terms grew by 8.6% (September 2019 from September 2018).
The largest growth in retail turnover in January-September 2019 compared to the same period in 2018 was recorded in Vinnytsia (by 17.6%), Ternopil (by 16.9%), Kyiv (by 15.7%) regions and Kyiv (by 14.7%).
The president’s bill about farmland turnover in Ukraine, which should be published within two weeks, allows legal entities to participate in the land market, acting Minister of Agricultural Policy and Food of Ukraine Olha Trofimtseva has said. “The president’s position regarding legal entities is quite liberal and this is one of the disagreements that exist between us. I believe that certain restrictions, safeguards should be established at the first transitional stage, I advocate a phased opening of the market and, accordingly, its phased liberalization,” she said at a press conference.
According to Trofimtseva, the presidential bill is based on the government’s bill.
“The changes that will be made in it concern legal entities, I think we will see it soon, it will be introduced in the Verkhovna Rada as the president’s bill, but this will be the subject of discussion after the first working day of the Verkhovna Rada, after the formation of the new Cabinet [of Ministers]. This is a question of a week or two,” the acting minister said.
In addition, Trofimtseva said that as part of the land reform, at least six or seven bills will be presented that will be aimed at the normal functioning of the land market.
BILL, FARMLAND, LEGAL ENTITIES, MARKET, PARTICIPATE, TURNOVER
