Source: materials biz.nv.ua.
One day, a chemical or waste incineration plant that can destroy the entire natural environment and turn your life into hell may be built next to a house where you live.
Do not want to think about this, do you?
To prevent this, the legislation establishes a procedure for assessing the environmental impact when planning such facilities. However, by this time, this procedure has existed on paper, because its application was a pure formality in many cases.
Starting from December 18, this topic will become extremely relevant while being on minds and generating additional revenues for a significant number of lawyers, civil servants and environmental activists. The reason is the entry into force of the Law of Ukraine “On Environmental Impact Assessment”. It is designed to not only meet the social demand for an effective and realistic procedure of assessing the way individual results of human activities will affect the environment, but also update the mechanism for such an assessment. The last point should be implemented under the Association Agreement between Ukraine and the EU, according to which our country committed to implement the Directive 2011/92/EU that regulates relevant issues in the European Union.
The introduction of this reform ran the risk of crossing the line in advance and creating hell not only for city residents or the environment, but also for entrepreneurs while taking cover behind the ideas of environmental protection. For those who are ready to risk their money and other resources by investing in the Ukrainian economy. The example of the United States, where the environmental impact assessment procedure often costs millions of dollars and lasts for years, and keeping this procedure within the bounds of reason becomes the priority of the administration of each president, regardless of his party identification, clearly illustrates such a risk. Of course, we can spend an infinite amount of money on the environment, but the question is just how much we could afford.
In any case, on May 23, our people’s deputies adopted the Law on Environmental Impact Assessment amid emotions and righteous indignation of frequent cases of environmental abuses. At the same time, parliamentarians ignored the practical wisdom about the devil in details, so several critically important and system mistakes of the law at once were simply undetected.
Firstly, the law has extremely failed to list the objects and activities that are subject to impact assessment. Annexes I and II of the Directive 2011/92/EU were taken as the basis of this list. However, according to the European model, Annex II is not subject to automatic application. EU member states either should decide whether each individual project is subject to the environmental impact assessment on a case-by-case basis or establish detailed thresholds for each type of activity listed in Annex II.
In most cases, drafters of the Ukrainian law did so. For example, not just the production of dairy products, but only such production, the volumes of which exceed 20 tons per day, should be subject to the environmental impact assessment. However, whether due to a lack of attention and
being in a rush, or due to errors in the calculations, clear thresholds were established not for all types of activities.
Therefore, it is quite predictable that businesses will face with heavy battles with officials regarding the fact what “deep drilling” means – is it 10, 50, 100, 1000 meters or more? And what is more, does a “long distance” water supply system mean 20 meters, a kilometer or two kilometers? Is it true that the production of any amount of starch, for example, 50 grams, requires a lengthy and costly bureaucratic procedure to assess environmental impacts?
Our people’s deputies deserve particular thanks for the cases, when the list of objects is established by a scheme of object A, object B, object C with characteristics of Y, when it is completely unclear whether the characteristics of Y are related only to object C or both objects A and B as well? For example, according to the law, heat power plants, CHP plants “and other facilities to produce electricity, steam and hot water with a heat capacity of 50 megawatts or more” are subject to the assessment. The question of whether these 50 megawatts are related only to “other facilities” or to both HPP and CHP plants as well will be a matter of argument for a long time.
Secondly, the law creates a problem with the time frame of its application for no reason at all. On the one hand, the law will come into effect on December 18, 2018, and from this date, it is theoretically possible to start carrying out the assessment procedure according to the new law. On the other hand, the law has entered into force since June 18, 2017, and since that date, it has become obligatory for objects and activities, which do not have any permits obtained. However, the issue of what to do with objects and activities, which did not require obtaining permit documents, remains a mystery. For example, they could be started on the basis of a declaration.
In addition, projects that were planned to begin in the transition period between June 18 and December 18, 2018, are almost in a hopeless situation, as the only chance to avoid their freezing is to obtain the state environmental appraisal as soon as possible. Of course, hardly anybody could use such an option or simply to realize this possibility. As a result, many projects that were launched in the “transition period” are now at risk and can be stopped at any time.
Third, and most importantly, the law does not provide a clear benchmark as to what motives government bodies will have during the environmental impact assessment procedure. Accordingly, how it will it be determined what activities should be allowed and which ones should be prohibited.
But this is not the whole story. Prohibition is not the only method environmental officers can use to influence the businesses. The next news for business will be the environmental conditions for activities – individual requirements that will be set by government bodies for each particular project or activity. Moreover, government bodies will be able to determine the amount of compensation businesses will need to pay for damages that will be caused to the environment in the future.
All these decisions will have a significant impact on the attractiveness and profitability of any business project that needs the environmental impact assessment. Unfortunately, it is a thankless task to predict exactly what government bodies will take into account during the assessment. The greatest danger is that, traditionally, in all cases when there is a significant discretion of an official, such an official is guided by motives that have nothing to do with public interests too often.
The environmental impact assessment is an excellent and necessary tool in state regulation. However, it works properly only when the state has a balance between economic and environmental interests. The risks and price of distortions are extremely high. Since regulatory mistakes mean not only unnecessary expenses for businesses, but also they carry a serious risk of discrediting environmental protection and European integration ideas. Therefore, the immediate work to amend the Law on Environmental Impact Assessment is on the agenda. And as of now, we can only hope that the improvement of such a procedure will not be a long story without clear timelines, as it traditionally happens in environmental regulation in our country.
Just said good-bye to one inspector, and another one is knocking at the door? Are your workers distracted from their duties to assist in the inspection for several months a year in general? Is there an inspector from another inspection agency requiring a workplace to be set up in your company on a regular basis? Does it sound familiar? Then you should know about…
Inspection life hack #2. Comprehensive inspections
If an enterprise is included into the inspection plans of several state supervision (control) bodies for the same year, according to the current legislation, this is the basis to conduct a comprehensive inspection.
What does it mean? Planned inspections of such state supervision (control) bodies should be conducted simultaneously and for a limited period of time – no more than ten working days for large and medium-sized enterprises. It is not allowed to carry out this activity for more than 5 working days for small and micro enterprises.
You can find all comprehensive inspections approved by the SRS for 2018 here.
If, in addition to carrying out a comprehensive inspection, another state supervision (control) agency, which “forgot” to inform the SRS about its planned inspection and therefore it was not included in the plan of comprehensive state supervision (control) measures for the current year, intends to inspect you, you have the right not to allow it.
However, this rule does not apply to all bodies, but only to those one subject to the Law of Ukraine “On Basic Principles of State Supervision (Control) in the Sphere of Economic Activity”. The list of government bodies, which will conduct comprehensive inspections in 2018 and, of course, for which this rule is compulsory, is available here.
The State Fiscal Service is included into this list.
Please also note that comprehensive inspections are only planned state supervision (control) measures. Unplanned inspections are carried out on a case-by-case basis.
In Ukraine, 287 out of 470 districts do not have any freely available urban planning documentation, and almost 80% of planning schemes have been developed before 1991. There is almost the same situation in other regions. 7 out of 24 regions of Ukraine do not have any territorial planning schemes at all.
This topic was discussed today at the presentation of the project “Participatory Spatial Planning in Ukraine” initiated by BRDO experts together with the Ministry of Regional Development and with the support of the МATRA project of the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The project’s outcome will be the creation of an open web resource to search and access urban planning documentation and filling it with the necessary information.
“For example, due to limited access to information, investors are not able to check, which land plots are undeveloped and can be used for construction projects. Therefore, it is a common practice to provide land plots for construction purposes in environmental protection areas, in coastal protection zones, green areas and only then – to legalize all these aspects in urban planning documentation,” the Construction Sector Head at BRDO Olena Shulyak said.
BRDO experts consider this situation unacceptable and believe that urban planning documents that regulate construction rules should be published for all administrative and territorial units. Moreover, it should be open and accessible, because it is not only a legal requirement, but also something that the public and investors, both domestic and foreign ones, need.
The web resource devoted to the Project is developed now. The test version is available at http://pmap.minregion.gov.ua/. There already are the study’s results on the quality and openness of data on regional planning schemes as well as a map to search for urban planning documents.
The pilot region in the framework of the Project will be the Sumy region. Today a relative Memorandum of Cooperation was signed.
“We glad that the Sumy region was the first region that joined the Project. This is an opportunity to make our region open and understandable both for investors and citizens,” the Head of Sumy Regional State Administration Mykola Klochko emphasized.
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For reference
According to the Ministry of Regional Development, only 24% of urban planning documents, which according to the State Statistics Service’s official report as of January 1, 2017, covered 460 cities, 885 urban-type settlements and 28,377 villages, are published in Ukraine.
Details of the Project are available at: https://brdo.com.ua/projects/vidkryte-prostorove-planuvannya/
The Government approved the decision to abolish 340 obsolete regulatory acts that was prepared by BRDO experts in partnership with the Ministry of Economic Development and the State Regulatory Service. These acts complicated life for entrepreneurs, required extra time and money to meet excessive, unnecessary requirements. So, abolishing the obsolete laws will reduce pressure, improve the business climate and reduce regulatory barriers to start and develop own business in Ukraine.
BRDO experts conducted a comprehensive review of 1,211 subordinate acts and concluded that it is necessary to abolish:
In addition, this will allow to:
On Tuesday, July 25, 2017 at 10:30, the presentation of the analytical study of the ability of central executive bodies to engage in public dialogue, on the basis of which the rating of ministries and agencies “Capacity for Dialogue” will be formed, will be held.
The study is focused on how Ukrainian ministries comply with the requirements for the openness and accessibility of information on their regulatory activities. Based on the study results, it was concluded that they fulfill, on average, only 47% of these requirements.
Presentation participants:
Venue: Ukraine crisis media center (Ukrainian House, 2 Khreshchatyk Street).
Admission by editorial cards only.
We invite you to participate in the event!
The Cabinet of Ministers made a step towards the liberalization of the use of cash registers (PTRs), in particular, increased the threshold from 200 thousand hryvnas to 500 thousand hryvnas for the obligatory use of PTRs.
The adoption of this decision will allow a significant number of small businesses involved in retail trade through the means of moving retail trade network (in markets, fairs, villages, canteens and buffets of secondary schools and vocational schools, etc.) to work without payment transaction recorders.
In addition, they increased the threshold from 75 thousand to 250 thousand hryvnas depending on forms and conditions of business activities per one structural (separate) unit of business entity, beyond which payment transaction recorders should be used.
This will reduce administrative pressure on entrepreneurs and allow businesses to save time and money on installing PTRs.
The resolution will not apply to business entities involved in retail sale of excisable goods, namely alcoholic beverages and tobacco products.
Today, the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine approved decisions that will facilitate the reorientation of the state supervision (control) system to the risk management system. Proposals prepared by BRDO experts in partnership with the Ministry of Economic Development and the State Regulatory Service provide for implementing a new approach aimed at moving from punishment to persuasion and risk prevention.
The first step in this area was the adoption of a today’s resolution regarding the revision of criteria for assessing risks arising from economic activities that makes amendments to 44 acts of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine. From now on, honest entrepreneurs will spend less amounts of their own money on inspections, and the state will reduce budget expenditures to conduct inspections.
This decision will stimulate both business owners to voluntarily comply with legal requirements and inspection bodies to provide business entities with consultations and explanations.
In general, the implementation of the risk-based approach involves several steps and is planned to be used up to 2020, when the national risk management system will be fully operational.
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Today, the “deregulation day”, which has resulted in the adoption of 12 business decisions and the abolition of 340 obsolete regulatory acts, was held at the Cabinet of Ministers. Initiatives have been prepared by the BRDO Office together with the Ministry of Economic Development and the State Regulatory Service.
In particular, the Resolution of the Cabinet of Ministers simplified the procedure of customs clearance of goods in sea and river ports. From now on, foreign vessels are allowed to enter Ukraine’s ports and unload goods in 24 hours after submitting electronic cargo information. It will accelerate customs procedures and reduce corruption opportunities.
The decision to extend the list of companies receiving quotas to receive and import chemical raw materials without paying the excise tax was an important step to stimulate an increase in domestic production and create adequate conditions for providing chemical enterprises of Ukraine with raw materials.
Another Government’s decision simplified the procedure for establishing representative offices of foreign companies and financial institutions in Ukraine that will improve the investment climate.
In addition, the Cabinet of Ministers supported the BRDO’s proposal to abolish 340 obsolete regulatory acts related to labor protection, fire safety, sanitary and epidemiological control. This step will significantly reduce corruption risks and regulatory pressure on business.
Today, the Government also made a step towards the liberalization of the use of cash registers (PTRs) having increased the annual amount from 200 thousand hryvnas to 500 thousand hryvnas for the obligatory use of PTRs.
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Source: 24tv.ua.
The Better Regulation Delivery Office (BRDO) proposes to establish 10% quota for parking lots with electric charging devices at the legislative level.
Developers emphasize that the development of infrastructure requires creating transparent conditions to connect to electricity networks, defining the product in the market at the legislative level, determining the status of charging units and electric charging stations and so on.
A study conducted by BRDO experts revealed additional barriers to the development of electric cars that can not be eliminated at the level of secondary laws.
In particular, with the purpose of systematizing the market of electric charging stations and integrating it with the electricity market, the Concept for development of the market of electric charging stations was developed.
“Today, one in every hundred cars sold in the world is an electric car, and it will be every second car in 2040. In Ukraine, a percentage of electric cars is much smaller – this is about 4 thousand cars serviced by 1.5 thousand ECS. The ECS infrastructure is not developed, so domestic consumers prefer traditional modes of transportation,” the Energy Sector Head at BRDO Oleksiy Orzhel said.
In particular, among other aspects, the Concept for development of the market of electric charging stations provides for equipping every 10th parking lot in large vehicle parking areas with electric charging stations.
It is planned to introduce parking lots for electric cars at the legislative level
Thus, by using a single app, any driver will be able to automatically find an ECS, track free parking lots with electric charging units and get information on prices for ECS-related services.
Are you waiting for a government inspector’s visit? That is, an inspector to inspect you. Unlike the days of Nikolay Gogol, today you can definitely check whether he has the right to hold inspections, and the BRDO Office will help you better understand “pitfalls” of the supervision and control system.
Inspection life hack #1. UNIFIED FORMS OF ACTS
Do you know that you have the right not to allow inspectors to conduct an inspection of your business, if a supervisory body that “sent” them did not prepare and publish unified forms of acts with an exclusive list of points for inspection on its website? No? Then let’s take a closer look.
What is a “unified form of act”? After any inspection, an inspector has to prepare a document describing what requirements he has checked and whether he has found any violations. This document is an inspection act. Based on the facts reported there, the inspection body may decide to impose a fine on an entrepreneur or the court may suspend his economic activity.
To avoid the situation, when inspectors make inspection acts as they wish, the supervisory body approves the unified form of such an act by its order – that is, the form to be used by all inspectors without exception. An important part of the unified form of inspection acts is a list of points for inspection, that is, a list of all the requirements that inspectors can check during the inspection (bit no more – they can not add requirements on their initiative).
If the supervisory body didn’t approve such a unified form or if it approved, but did not posted on its website – you have the right not to allow inspectors from this body to conduct inspections. You can use the list prepared by the State Regulatory Service here to find those supervisory bodies that have already approved unified forms of acts.
Yesterday, the Government improved the procedure to obtain permits for special water use by adopting amendments developed by the BRDO Office together with the State Agency of Water Resources and the Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources of Ukraine. From now on, business owners will spend twice less time and save a lot of money on it. The expenses of entrepreneurs will be six times less, because they will have to pay 23 thousand hryvnas instead of 150 thousand hryvnas. In addition, now they do not go anywhere to obtain permits, since it can be obtained in the territorial units of the State Agency of Water Resources.
Moreover, the need to obtain individual approvals from the Ministry of Health and the State Service on Geology and Mineral Resources personally by applicants was canceled, the procedure to extend the term of special water use was simplified and an application form, which will contain an exclusive list of documents submitted to obtain permits, was approved.
In Ukraine, the development of the segment of environmentally friendly transport modes is restrained by the absence of the market of electric charging services. The development of infrastructure requires creating transparent conditions to connect to electricity networks, define this product in the market at the legislative level, determine the status of charging units and electric charging stations and so on.
The Better Regulation Delivery Office (BRDO) conducted a comprehensive analysis of the regulation of the segment, which is on the intersection between transport and energy sectors. The analysis revealed additional barriers to development of electric cars that can not be eliminated at the level of secondary laws. In such a way, to systematize the market of electric charging stations and integrate it with the electricity market, we have developed the Concept for development of the market of electric charging stations (ECS).
“Consumer preferences are changing rapidly. Today, one in every hundred cars in the world is an electric car, and it will be every second car in 2040. In Ukraine, a percentage of electric cars is much smaller – this is about 4 thousand cars serviced by 1.5 thousand ECS. The ECS infrastructure is not developed, so domestic consumers prefer traditional modes of transportation. It is bad for the environment, increases dependence on imports of energy resources and constrains Ukraine’s integration into the world trade. We should create a reliable infrastructure and encourage consumers to use the latest technologies,” the Energy Sector Head at BRDO Oleksiy Orzhel said at the presentation of the document held at the Interfax News Agency on December 14.
In particular, the Concept for development of the market of electric charging stations provides for the following:
· Every 10th parking lot in large vehicle parking areas should be equipped with the ECS.
· Free access for suppliers and consumers to ECS.
· The possibility to buy and sell electricity online.
· A transparent procedure of interaction between ECS operators and local authorities, a simplified procedure to obtain permits and related documents.
Learn more about the Concept here and leave your comments here.
Moreover, the Concept provides for a full digitalization of the process. As a result, by using a single app, any user will be able to automatically find an ECS, track free parking lots with electric charging units, get information on prices for ECS-related services and so on.
A business case “Electric Charging Station”, which provides step-by-step instructions on starting this type of business in Ukraine, was also created on the Platform for Effective Regulation PRO. The case offers a check-list to create the infrastructure of electric charging stations: what documents to collect, how long each procedure will take, where to apply for and so on.
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The BRDO Office starts reviewing the state price regulation to create an effective system of price stability in the long term. After the analysis, we will prepare recommendations for changes in the regulation of state price policy.
Even at this stage, we can say that there are about 200 irrelevant regulatory acts in price regulation that should be abolished, and 20 regulatory acts that will require some amendments.
If you are a business entity and your products, works and services are subject to state price regulation, we invite you to participate in the survey. Your every answer is a chance to create a more favorable business environment for the development of your organization.
BRDO in collaboration with MATRA project and the Ministry of Regional Development, Construction, and Housing of Ukraine starts “pMAP – Open Spacial Planning” project to create a single open web-source of existing urban planning documentation.
Presentation will take place on Wednesday, December 19, 2017, at 10:00 in LigaBusinessInform press-center (23 T.Shamryla st., Kyiv).
Participants:
• Lev Partzkhaladze, Deputy Minister of Regional Development, Construction, and Housing of Ukraine
• Ed Hoeks, Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador of the Kingdom of the Netherlands (TBC)
• Olena Shuliak, Head of the Sector “Construction”, Better Regulation Delivery Office (BRDO)
• Mykola Klochko, Head of the Sumy Regional State Administration (TBC)
During the presentation the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding among the Ministry, BRDO, and Sumy Regional State Administration is planned.
To participate please register: bit.ly/2jvrUrl
Press registration: [email protected] or +38 050 850 96 66
Source: www.uscc.ua.
Industry players will discuss the barriers and prospects of the steel construction market development at the VI National Conference of steel construction market participants “Strategies. Development. Prospects”. The Head of BRDO Construction sector Olena Shuliak will tell about the current situation and the future of the sector in terms of its regulation.
The first two of four conference sessions are devoted to the market of metal frames.
As part of the first session, there will be presentations on the following topics:
Aleksandr Levshin, the General Director of Ukrstal Construction, Evgenii Fyodorov, the General Director of BF-Zavod and Yurii Karpenko, the General Director of GK Osnova, will join the discussion in the second session. Aleksandr Martyniuk will be the moderator.
“There are many problems, including the communication ones, between participants and suppliers of the industry, in the segment of production of metal frames,” the Executive Director of the USCC Vyacheslav Kolesnik said. “At this conference, we have a unique opportunity to discuss them with all interested parties, outline ways to resolve them, ways to develop cooperation within the industry and improve the competitiveness of its participants. We invite all regular industry players to support UCSS efforts and take part in the conference.”
The conference will be held from 9:00 to 19:00 on December 14, 2017. Address: Kiev, 52, Antonovich st., DEPO conference hall.
Pre-registration is required. To register, please fill in the registration form or contact the organizers. Contact person – Lyubov Shulyk: +38-097-357-23-39, +38-044-280-18-20, [email protected]. Participation in the conference is free of charge.