China in 2019-2020 will provide Ukraine with free technical and economic assistance for 200 million yuan ($29.7 million), most of which will be used to purchase special emergency rescue vehicles and equipment for the State Emergencies Service.
The corresponding intergovernmental agreement was signed in Kyiv on April 11, the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade reported.
According to the report, the State Emergencies Service should receive more than 50 units of machinery, in particular, cranes, crawler bulldozers, motor graders, fire trucks with lifting platforms and fire trucks with a ladder for rescue operations.
The signed intergovernmental agreement also provides for the provision of equipment for simultaneous translation and conference systems of the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade, as well as the implementation of other coordinated Ukraine-China intergovernmental projects.
Swiss International, part of Lufthansa Group, is increasing the number of Zurich-Kyiv flights from four to six per week from April, Lufthansa Group Country Manager Rene Koinzack has said. “From April 7, the number of flights will be increased to six per week and from July they will be carried out daily,” he told reporters at the Embassy of Switzerland in Kyiv on April 5.
Koinzack added that the flights will be carried out by Bombardier CS300 [for 135 passengers] and CS100 [for 110 passengers] planes.
He also told Interfax-Ukraine that it was too early to talk about a possibility of launching new flights from Kyiv or Ukrainian cities to Switzerland by the airline. Koinzack recalled that the flight between Zurich and Kyiv was resumed only a year ago and the number of passengers on this flights would be increased by 50%. Thus, the company needs some time to analyze results of such changes.
As reported, Swiss International Air Lines stopped performing direct flights between Kyiv and Zurich from October 1, 2014.
“The Zurich-Kyiv route did not come up to our expectations. The situation in Ukraine also played its role,” a representative of the airline, Sonja Ptaszek, said.
The airline resumed flights on this route from March 26, 2018.
The European Commission is ready to cooperate with any candidate elected in the presidential elections in Ukraine, Katarina Mathernova, the Deputy Director-General for Neighborhood and Enlargement Negotiations at the European Commission, said in a comment to Hromadske. She said it doesn’t matter whether Zelensky [showman Volodymyr Zelensky] or Poroshenko [incumbent President Petro Poroshenko] will be elected, they will work with any of them.
Mathernova said that Zelensky was not known in the political sphere, therefore, the voice of Ukrainian civil society should be especially heard and supported.
If there is Poroshenko’s second term, we know that the second term is still a slightly different mobilization, a new factor for civil society, she added.
The State Service of Ukraine on Food Safety and Consumers’ Rights Protection and the authorized body of Saudi Arabia have approved the form of the international veterinary certificate for exports of Ukrainian beef and products made of it.
The Ukrainian authority posted the information on its website on Monday.
As reported, in January 2019, Ukraine and Singapore approved veterinary certificates for exports of poultry and products made of it, shell eggs and egg products from Ukraine.
As of March 7, 2019, Ukraine has started sowing early grain and leguminous crops in seven regions. The crops had been sowed on 58,000 ha or 3% of the target.
According to a report of the Agricultural Policy and Food Ministry of Ukraine, spring barley was sowed on 34,000 ha (2%), wheat on 1,000 ha (1%), peas on 23,000 ha (7%) and millet on 500 ha.
In addition, fertilizer input on areas with winter crops in grain was finished on 4.6 million ha (60% of the target).
Fertilizers were input on 3.8 million ha with winter wheat (59%), on 43,000 ha with winter rye (38%) and 718,000 ha with winter barley (71%).
In addition, areas with winter rapeseeds were filled with fertilizers on 1.1 million ha (83%).
The ministry said that the logistics of agricultural products remains a bottleneck of Ukrainian exports.
“Therefore, there is a proposal and a common desire of the response team members [the interdepartmental response team in agricultural logistics] to transfer its work to the systemic track. In parallel with the current and urgent issues, we will work on a long-term development strategy and logistics efficiency in agriculture, and jointly worked out decisions and proposals will be submitted to the meetings of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine,” Acting Minister of Agricultural Policy and Food Olha Trofimtseva said.
According to her, among the key issues requiring strategic discussion are three issues: the predictability of operation or closure of low-efficiency stations and the possibility of alternative solutions; fair and transparent pricing; systematic vision of the formation of routes of transportation of agricultural products in 2019.
Real wages in Ukraine in January 2019 compared with January 2018 increased by 9.5%, while compared with December 2018 it decreased by 13.6%, the State Statistics Service has reported. According to the service, the average nominal wage of full-time employees in January 2019 compared with the previous month decreased by 12.8%, in annual terms it grew by 19.6%, reaching UAH 9,223.
The authority said that in December 2018, it amounted to UAH 10,573, November – UAH 9,161, October – UAH 9,218, September – UAH 9,042, August – UAH 8,977 and July – UAH 9,170.
According to the statistics department, the largest increase in the average wage of full-time employees in January 2019 compared with January 2018 was observed in Zaporizhia (25.1%), Poltava (23.5%), Dnipropetrovsk (23.0%), Vinnytsia (22.4%), Ternopil (20.5%) and Kharkiv (20.2%) regions, while in Kyiv city this figure was 17.6%.
The highest level of wages in the past month was recorded in Kyiv city – UAH 13,721, and the lowest in Chernivtsi region – UAH 6,958.
In January 2019 compared with the same month of 2018, wages increased the most in IT and telecommunications – by 25.2%, in industry – by 24.9%, in construction – by 24.0%, in public administration and defense, compulsory social insurance – by 22.9%, administrative and support services – by 21.8%, and real estate transactions – by 20.3%.
