In order to fully comply with the requirements of our legislation, collect an incredible amount of certificates, documents, licenses and others, entrepreneurs simply should forget about their business for an indefinite period of time and spend a lot of time to obtain approval documents. And if you think that then this will work as expected – no, they will be still to blame for something. Here is the question of how to do everything in accordance with the law and, at the same time, not go into bankruptcy and not be in arrears. After all, every downtime day in business means a certain risk and losses.
Today starting a business in Ukraine is a real challenge. It is time-consuming, expensive and problematic. We offer clear answers to complicated questions on the PRO platform. Take up this challenge, do your job, build a business. We will be here with you and do everything to make the state and its services as convenient as possible.
It all started with the fact that we had a task to analyze the legislation to improve the rules for business in the framework of the PRO project – the Platform for Effective Regulation that we are implementing. And our goal is not just to prepare a regular report, which will die under the dust on the shelves of one of the Ministries, but to make a really effective platform for those who are just planning to start their business or have long been working on the market and are planning to grow and develop. In addition, the information published on the portal could be updated, supplemented and used in a timely manner.
We have created a unique platform that has no analogues in the world. Anyone who visits our website can obtain clear instructions on how to do a certain business. Today, users can choose any area among 15 cases available on the website: restaurants, beauty salons, sawmills, kindergartens, electric charging stations, etc. We are planning to increase their amount to 30 by the end of the year. Vinnytsia, Mykolaiv and Chernivtsi local authorities and non-governmental organizations have already joined the project.
In parallel with the development of the Platform, analysts of the Better Regulation Delivery Office prepared the ranking “Ease of doing business. Regional doing business” to assess how easy and convenient it is to conduct business activities in the regions of Ukraine. BRDO experts adapted the World Bank’s methodology and interviewed hundreds of domestic entrepreneurs. Four areas of interaction between entrepreneurs and the government were used as the basis, including: paying local taxes, obtaining construction permits, registering land plots for real estate and connecting to electricity networks.
For example, in the Kherson region, it will take on average 147 days to obtain construction permits, while in the Odessa region – only 68 days. Such factors do not create favorable conditions for investments, and sometimes they really transform into a stop sign for entrepreneurs. In order to make life easier for entrepreneurs and create the most comfortable business environment, BRDO experts developed recommendations to resolve both such situations and a number of other issues identified during the study for each region of Ukraine.
I am sure that most of future entrepreneurs who want to open their business, such as a restaurant or bakery, are not always aware of the huge amount of work that they will need to do and all
risks they will face with. And it is unlikely that they wake up thinking of what certificate they can get today. This is a minor issue, which ordinary people are not interested in, because most often they imagine a wonderful result they want to have at the end of this process. They are interested in everything taken as a whole.
We have made the first step and standardized the work of our experts. From now on, everyone who visits our portal will be able to see the full list of procedures he/she will need to go through to start a business with minimal expenses and losses. All procedures, licenses, descriptions of these licenses, sanctions and what will happen if you do not obtain a license.
You visit the website, select the appropriate case, for example, “Restaurant”, take a kind of test and get a personalized answer: how many procedures you will need to go through, what documents to obtain and how long it takes.
In such a way, entrepreneurs can protect themselves from “sudden” inspections, stresses and bribes. Because everything will be okay with their business. Moreover, taking into account our recommendations, they will be able to develop own action plans and not to be in arrears.
Would you like to learn more about this? I, Oleksiy Dorohan, Platform for Effective Regulation PRO project manager, am waiting for you at the largest festival for entrepreneurs Get Business Festival in Kyiv at the NSC “Olympic” on October 20. I will speak within the theme “Finance” from 17:00 to 17:30.
Source: radioosvoboda.org.
The Deputy Head of BRDO Denis Malyuska does not agree that corruption is a main reason for foreign investors not to enter the Ukrainian market. He says that sometimes it is quite the contrary. “If a large investor can get guaranteed state support for a small amount of money, it is an advantage for this investor,” Denis Malyuska says.
“If corruption brings a result, and a large investor can get guaranteed state support, even when it is illegal, for a small amount of money, a relatively small percentage, this is an advantage for this investor.”
A specific character of the Ukrainian corruption is that it does not provide any guarantees. In our case, even corruption can not provide any sound guarantees.
“In our country, even corruption can not provide sound guarantees to any investor. Therefore, corruption in our present situation is not the corruption that a foreign investor will be fine with,” he explains.
Thus, we should fight against corruption not because it discourages investors, but because it creates problems for the state and taxpayers.
As for the attraction of investors, Malyuska believes that the government should play a crucial role providing them with guarantees to enter the Ukrainian market. The lawyer refers to the draft law 6540, which is currently under consideration in the parliament and aimed at protecting minority investors in Ukraine. He adds that besides legislative changes, we need additional institutional mechanisms to protect investors.
Denis Malyuska: There should be a package of guarantees for large foreign investors who would establish a powerful production here.
“There should be a package of guarantees, possibly secured by foreign arbitration, for large foreign investors who would establish a powerful production here and produce products for export.”
The software development market creates 100 thousand highly paid jobs and ranks 3rd in terms of total currency earnings. This sector has huge potential for growth, and our state is one of the most attractive countries to place contracts in outsourcing of business processes and IT. But the sector requires stable tax regulation, skilled personnel and the involvement of foreign staff. How to improve this situation?
What solutions will allow to ensure stable and predictable rules for doing business in IT? How to fully integrate into the global IT market and create favorable conditions for attracting staff to the Ukrainian software development market? How to make the sector a driving force of economic development and digital transformation of the country?
The government, business and market representatives will try to find answers during the roundtable “IT Future Talks – Software Development Market” in Kyiv on October 19. The event will become a platform for communication between the IT business and the Government, which will cover the situation in the sector, specifics of its regulation as well as the removal of barriers that hinder the development of the industry.
Participation:
BRDO experts conducted a rolling review of the regulatory framework that regulates the market. The results are presented in an analytical study – the Green Paper “Software Development Market”, which will be discussed during the roundtable: http://bit.ly/2yjcsU7
Join the dialogue!
Venue: Kyiv, UNIT.City (1, Dorohozhitskaya st.)
Time: 16:00, October 19, 2017
Details: http://bit.ly/2yjcsU7
Additional information is available by phone: 063 440 47 07.
Media accreditation at 099 256 59 56.
There are 24 enterprises operating on the cement market in Ukraine, and 2/3 of them are loss-making. Taking into account present production rates, Ukraine is provided with cement raw materials for 320 years. In 2016, enterprises produced more than 9 million tons of cement, and the construction industry consumed 9.5 million tons.
The deficit in terms of domestic production is covered by imports, first of all – from Turkey and the Republic of Belarus. The year 2016 has shown the 40% reduction in Ukrainian cement exports and the increase in imports by 41%.
In Ukraine, the domestic consumption of cement is considerably lower than not only world trends, but also our closest neighbors. We rank the second worst in Europe in terms of this indicator.
In accordance with the study of the range of retail networks, experts estimated that the percent of fake cement products in the Ukrainian market is 60%: 82% of the checked packaged cement turned out to be forgery, while more than 50% of cement had less weight, and about 60% did not meet the strength criteria.
The total cost of business regulation for one economic entity in the market is not less than 400 thousand hryvnas per year.
The current regulatory framework hinders the development of the market while creating a barrier to new technologies and access to external markets, and does not guarantee the protection of consumers from counterfeit and hazardous products.
BRDO experts have prepared the Green Paper “Artificial construction materials: Cement”. We invite you to participate in the survey, the results of which will help us prepare recommendations for changes in the regulation of the cement market. Each response is a chance to create a more favorable business environment and contribute to the development of your organization. For answers: [email protected]
[gview file=”https://brdo.com.ua/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Anketa_TSement_PD.docx”]
Source: delo.ua.
In all European countries, land development rules are strictly regulated by the law, and it is very expensive to deviate from them. At the same time, all cities and towns have land-use plans and these plans as well as all city planning documents are available to the public. Accordingly, every citizen or entrepreneur sees who builds in the territory, where there are free plots, what is built and what plans for these land plots in the future.
In Ukraine, only 72.6% of settlements have land-use plans and only 24% of them are available to the public. It should be noted that most of these plans come from the USSR.
Therefore, it is not surprising that we have chaotic urban development projects, unfinished and unauthorized projects, the development of nature conservation and green zones and the management of land resources in manual mode with high corruption risks.
There were attempts to improve the situation. For example, in 2011, a new Regulation on the Urban Development Cadastre, which changed the document dated 1993, was adopted. Truly speaking, only after 4 years, in 2015, the Government made the next step – the Regulation on data sets that should be published in the form of public data was adopted. In May 2017, another resolution prepared with the active involvement of BRDO experts and aimed at addressing the issue of providing public access to the urban planning documentation in Ukraine was adopted.
Today is October 2017, and despite the existence of the entire legislative framework, urban planning documentation, which is guide for the planning and development of cities and towns and their infrastructure from networks to traffic flows, remains not available for the public and for the business.
There are two reasons for this. The first one is the lack or obsolescence of documents. The second one is the usual non-compliance by the local authorities with the law on the disclosure of information on urban planning documentation.
Why is this so important, and how do we benefit from the disclosure?
First, the public’s access to urban planning documentation, part of which, strange to say in the 21st century, sometimes is marked as “for official use only”, will remove social tensions in society, especially regarding the illegal construction projects in parks and natural preservation zones. After all, every Ukrainian will have the opportunity to check, in particular, in the city’s general plan whether it is planned to build an industrial plant next to his house or a shopping center in the park where he is walking around with the children every day, or not.
Secondly, it will help citizens make the right choice when purchasing real estate and protect them from inappropriate investments. After all, open documentation allows you to check the location of the property in terms of, for example, environmental standards. Namely, to assess whether there is a facility that could pose chemical pollution threats nearby.
This is also related to such a factor as the development of social infrastructure and plans for it, because urban planning documents usually contain this information. This is included to general plans for sure.
Thirdly, public access to urban planning documentation will increase the interest of foreign investors in Ukraine. Because today not having found the necessary information in public sources, they are not ready to spend time and money on looking for intermediaries, making contacts with local authorities, inquiries and getting official copies. They just do not go to us!
A list of arguments why public access is important for both citizens and businesses goes on. This topic will be described and discussed many times. But facts are a stubborn thing. As many as 33 detailed territorial plans, 14 general plans and 3 schemes of individual inter-district territories have been published on the Unified State web-portal Data.gov.ua. For almost 31,000 territorially administrative units in the country.
A thousandth of a percent. Is it impressive? We were impressed, so we decided to helm the government to stay in line with the current legislation and publish all available urban planning documentation. With the support of the Ministry of Regional Development and the MATRA Project from the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the BRDO Office is launching the project “Open Spatial Planning pMAP”. As part of the project, a unified portal, where you can find all the information about the city planning documentation in Ukraine, will be created.
We have already started our activity and plan to provide the Ukrainian and investors with a convenient working tool with full and open data in a year and a half. We sincerely count on the support of all who want to know where he lives and what he owns, in what conditions our children will live and what is planned to be built in the territory of his native Ukraine. After all, it is possible to own only what you know.
[gview file=”https://en.brdo.com.ua/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2017/10/Dajdzhest_27.09.17-1.pdf”]
Source: delo.ua.
Why will the raising of long-term credit rating of Ukraine from Caa3 to Caa2 by the Moody’s agency have little impact on the cost of credit resources for our country.
The Moody’s credit agency raised the long-term credit rating of Ukraine from Caa3 to Caa2. In addition, the rating outlook was improved from the “stable” to “positive” one. The improved rating and outlook are explained by reforms and accumulated foreign reserves. However, the agency’s decision will have little impact on the cost of credit resources for Ukraine.
First, the new rating recorded a cumulative effect of structural reforms. The reforms in the following areas are mentioned as the most urgent ones: the natural gas market (raising tariffs allowed to get rid of the quasi-fiscal deficit of Naftogaz), public procurements, taxation (simplified procedures and automated VAT refunds).
The agency has been assessing the cumulative effect for one year and 9 months – the previous rating activity was carried out on November 19, 2015. If reforms continue, it will further improve the financial position of the state. In particular, Moody’s stresses the importance of the pension reform to reduce another quasi-fiscal deficit. It is expected that if appropriate initiatives are implemented, the Pension Fund deficit will be halved to 3% of GDP for a decade.
Secondly, the significant improvement in the external position also had a certain impact. At the time of the start of the IMF program in early 2015, foreign exchange reserves amounted to less than $5 billion. The external vulnerability indicator (EVI, the ratio of external public debt to reserves) was almost 700%. Now the amount of reserves is three times more – $15 billion, and the EVI has fallen to 200-250%. This is still a lot, but much better than it was.
Reserves were increased mainly due to new loans, mainly from the IMF. That is, we will also have to recover this money.
Prospects for further improvement of the rating are limited by the fact that in 2019-2021, Ukraine will have to pay large sums of external debt. These payments require the external financing in larger volumes than it is expected from official lenders like the IMF. Moreover, the risks include the possible escalation of the conflict in the East and the presidential and parliamentary elections in 2019.
At the same time, even after this improvement, the Moody’s rating is below Standard & Poor’s and Fitch ratings by 2 points. Therefore, the rating improvement is, in principle, a good news as some investors use the risk assessment at the lowest indicator among three major rating agencies. Moreover, a positive outlook means the possibility of further raising in several months. Probably, even by these two points at once – there were such and even more radical rating actions, including in the relations between Moody’s and Ukraine.
To tell the truth, this may be not enough, since this rating is still in the category of “significant risks”, while the ratings of competitors are already included in the higher category of “highly speculative rating”. The current rating from other agencies means that the risk premium of Ukrainian foreign bonds will be about 8%, the rating from Moody’s – 10%. That is, if someone considers only the worst rating, this small increase will not do anything.
By the way, the secondary market of Ukrainian Eurobonds did not essentially react to the change of this rating. As of 19:00 on August 28, prices for different bonds changed mixed compared with the previous trading day. Both the decline to 0.172% and the growth to 0.168% were recorded. Moreover, declines and growths were evenly distributed throughout the spectrum of securities regardless maturity dates. Let’s recall that bonds with maturity from 2019 to 2040 are currently traded on the market.
In addition, keep in mind that staying in the current category, in principle, does not allow having conservative investors such as pension funds among purchasers. But this requires an investment level (from BBB- or Baa3) that Ukraine has never had. By the way, only Russia and Kazakhstan can boast this level among the CIS countries.
Therefore, the government still has a lot of work to do in the future. As the first step, we would like to return to the level we had in 2005-2008 – BB-/B1 (this is three levels higher than now). And then we need to work to achieve the investment category.
Source: epravda.com.ua.
Ukraine exports 98% of raw materials for glass production to Russia and Belarus, and then imports the finished glass from these countries. That’s why, it is not surprisingly that Ukraine still plays a raw-exports role in the global market.
Ukraine ranks second in Eastern Europe in terms of available glass raw materials.
Most of the deposits, the number of which is about 100, have proven reserves of 5 million tons in each of them. And sometimes this figure is much larger. For example, in the Novoselovskoye deposit near Kharkiv, the estimated reserves are 18.03 million tons.
However, these impressive resources are used in a quite strange manner. Every year, 2% of extracted raw materials are processed into low-quality products that can not be used in our construction industry due to the outdated technology, which has not changed since the beginning of the 19th century.
Another 18% are bought by Belarus. But other 80% are exported to Russia. Last year, exports to this country amounted to 300 thousand tons with the value of $6 million.
And this is at a time when there is a demand for about 3.4 billion square meters of modern building glass in the domestic market. When there are 245 million tons of explored reserves of raw materials. When the reserves will be sufficient for 130 years and even more.
Instead, the import of quality glass only to produce double-glazed windows amounted to 314 thousand tons last year. And those 673 tons of glass, which we have produced last year (by using a method of pulling and casting with grinding), gather dust in warehouses.
The reason is simple – they can not be used in modern construction according to technical standards of the European Union, which the country has committed to start using within the framework of the Association with the EU.
Ukrainian construction companies and windows manufacturers have long adapted to this situation, and they simply import the glass from the same Russia and Belarus, pumping nearly 80 million dollars annually to the economies of these countries.
However, sooner or later, such a model presses heavily on citizens. After all, they cover all currency fluctuations and rising prices for modern windows.
And what about the world
The annual growth of the world sheet glass production is 7%. The average level of glass consumption per capita in the world is differentiated depending on the level of economic development.
For example, the consumption level for transitional or emerging economies is from 3 to 5 kg per capita. In developed Europe, this is 18-28 kg depending on the country.
Ukraine is among outsiders: it produces approximately 3.5 kg per person and consumes less than 5 kg per citizen. Moreover, these 3.5 kg produced do not include the modern float glass. That is, the demand for modern glass is 100% met due to the import.
Why so
The lack of modern glass production in Ukraine is associated with the business logic of producers – allegedly, plant are built where there is a market, raw materials and profits. But the figures analyzed above and the fact we will discuss below refute these arguments.
For example, in Belarus, there is a number of modern glass factories while reserves of raw materials are 100% of Ukrainian ones. Belarus imports almost 80% of raw materials for glass, and this does not stop foreign investors who work there.
Another example is Kazakhstan, the reserves of which are estimated at 13-28 million tons. Well, this country plans to build a plant with a capacity of 140 thousand tons a year by using the investors’ funds in two years. Investors are the UAE, Kuwait, China and the United Kingdom.
These projects are the results of the implementation of state policy on domestic demand and industrial development.
Ukraine, which had 30 glass factories at different times, did not succeed in providing such support. None of these plants produced nothing more than the “gray” glass of poor quality. And the four factories that produced the sheet glass and one factory in Luhansk that produced the glass by using a modern method couldn’t operate for a long time without support.
Actually, this is a reason Why Ukraine still plays a raw-exports role on the global market. The country gives a lion’s share of added value and a large number of jobs to economies of other countries.
Exporting raw materials, we receive $ 6 million, and then import finished glass products possibly made from our own raw materials in the amount of $ 80-90 million.
What comes next?
Today, the world practice demonstrates that it is necessary to have one glass tempering line with a capacity of 200 square meters per hour for every 1 million people to provide a stable supply of domestic glass within the country.
That is, Ukraine needs at least 40 such lines. In the country, There are all the conditions, with the exception of a comfortable business climate for investors and clear and effective regulatory rules of business operation in this segment, to construct them.
We are talking about a chronic “Soviet school” of rules and standards, which make Ukrainian producers dependent on imports. This is especially true for the segment of modern energy-efficient window systems. It is possible to solve their problem, as well as the problem of the market as a whole – by attracting regular investors and introducing transparent and friendly rules for businesses.
With such a purpose, we need to take some simple regulatory and organizational steps.
First, it is necessary to provide the transparent and non-corruption access to the development of glass quarries. To eliminate the corruption, which is a common practice for government officials in this area, and create incentive conditions for real producers.
Secondly, it is necessary to provide special conditions to allocate land plots and connect to engineering networks for investors in this sector, who are critical for the development of Ukraine.
Thirdly, to guarantee the security of investments by using the effective regulatory framework.
Fourthly, to create the preconditions for a profitable operation in the market. For example, to direct the state energy efficiency program to the domestic production: use “warm loans” to compensate not for all products, but for only those produced from Ukrainian glass and in Ukrainian enterprises.
Fifthly, to start negotiations with investors at the state level with a preliminary analysis of the top glass producers in the world. For example, we shouldn’t conduct the first negotiations with the ATEC Holding (operates in Belarus), Asahi Glass, Saint-Gobain, Pilkington, Guardian (which run the manufacturing in Russia and are not interested in losing the Ukrainian market) among TOP-10 world sheet glass manufacturers.
The Turkish Sisecam and Taiwan Glass, which have joint interstate projects with Poland and the Baltic States, are among the promising investors.
And then, perhaps, we will be able to return at least 70 million in other currencies, which Ukraine pays to other countries for glass imports, in the Ukrainian economy annually. If we make a little effort, we can also receive 200 million euros of direct investments, which an investor will spend on the construction of a modern glass factory.
How long will it take to register a taxi service legally? How to open a charging station for electric cars? How long will it take obtain permissions to open a kindergarten? Where to contact when Internet service providers need to get access to infrastructure facilities? How to get an act on sanitary and epidemiological expertise for a family doctor’s office?
Typically, Ukrainian entrepreneurs are looking for answers to these questions on their own.
On September 20, the BRDO will bring together the government representatives who create rules for business and the entrepreneurs who need to live according to these rules.
The participants will discuss all the disadvantages of the legislation and ways to simplify the procedures by using the example of real World Cafe cases. Ulyana Suprun and family practitioners will discuss the opening of a doctor’s office, while Lev Partskhaladze and the representatives of a network of children’s educational institutions will talk about the pitfalls of registering documents for kindergartens. Volodymyr Omelyan and market participants will define legislative barriers of the electric charging station’s operation. Kseniya Lyapina and the Ukrainian Internet service providers will speak about the peculiarities of providing Internet services in regions. Maksim Nefyodov and restaurateurs will discuss a number of regulatory procedures.
The BRDO has created an effective regulation platform PRO, which contains step-by-step instructions on starting a business. From now on, entrepreneurs do not need to study dozens of websites and complicated explanations. They just need to answer some specialized questions on the PRO Platform and obtain a check-list of steps: what documents to collect, how long each procedure takes, where to contact and so on. Try it!
Details at http://start.regulation.gov.ua/
Join!
Seats are limited!
On September 20, 15:30, Kyiv, D12 gallery, 12, Desyatynna street.
Ukraine has 4 thousand kilometers of potentially navigable waterways, but uses less than 10% of own capacity to transport cargo by river. The share of transportation by inland waterways (IWW) is less than 1% of the total transportation volume in the country, while the average rate in the EU countries is 7%. The Better Regulation Delivery Office (BRDO) found out that the development of the cheapest and most environmentally friendly type of cargo transportation in Ukraine was hampered by the lack of effective regulation in the sector.
The state, business and public representatives as well as expert circles worked out the ways to solve the market problems during the roundtable “Development of the market of cargo river transportation in Ukraine” as part of the Public Dialogue # PRODialogue on September 12.
The BRDO Office conducted a rolling review of the quality of market regulation in terms of the efficiency, corruption risks and the business-friendliness, the results of which showed that almost half of 45 regulatory acts on the market are illegal (16 acts) or ineffective (5 acts). “It is impossible to determine the achievement of goals for 10 of 14 river regulation tools, there are simply no mechanisms for determining the efficiency. As a result, the river infrastructure is collapsing, the investment attractiveness of the sector is falling, the country’s economy loses the huge potential,” the Head of Transport Sector at the BRDO Taras Slobodyanyuk said when presenting the results of this review.
The main constraints for potential market operators and the market growth are the high cost of transportation to the river and transshipment, the non-competitive price of IWW transportation compared to the railways, high capital costs to purchase or construct the fleet, low potential number of services and the low speed of rotation of ships due to the lack of guaranteed depths and a high risk of accidents on lock gate facilities.
At the same time, the development of inland waterways and the reorientation of some cargo transportation towards this sector would help to free up roads, save money on road repairs, compensate for the lack of railway vehicles and give a powerful incentive for the development of agrarian and metallurgical industries, which are the main drivers of the market. Today, the market of cargo river transportation is 6.5 million tons per year and has a potential to triple its volume by 2020.
Volodymyr Omelyan, the Minister of Infrastructure of Ukraine, also emphasized this fact: “A lack of a basic law for river transport along with a logistics strategy has led to the situation when in Ukraine, there are 13 times less transportation volumes by water ways, than in European countries. The adoption of the law provides us with a real opportunity to triple the transportation volumes, attract investors and have access to European waterways.”
The basic law “On Inland Water Transport” is designed to systematically reform the market of cargo river transportation with the aim to increase its efficiency, ensure sufficient financing, eliminate unjustified barriers and costs for business and create a competitive market. Market participants should jointly find solutions to a number of key points:
A separate aspect is the harmonization of the regulation of the IWW cargo transportation market with requirements of the Association Agreement between Ukraine and the EU, which provides for the implementation of 6 IWW directives by Ukraine. In particular, the Directive 2008/68 /EC on the inland transportation of dangerous goods in its implementation should be finished by 01/09/2018 that will require making amendments to the Law of Ukraine “On Transportation of Dangerous Goods”.
“The harmonization of Ukrainian legislation with European rules in accordance with provisions of the Association Agreement with the EU will stimulate the development of river transportation in Ukraine, attract investments into the economy and integrate Ukrainian waterways into international transport corridors,” the Head of EU Cooperation programs Berend de Groot said.
The event was attended by international experts, business and public representatives and expert circles. The results of the discussion will be used as the basis to develop particular legislative initiatives in the market.
Ukraine has 4 thousand kilometers of potentially navigable waterways, but uses only 10% of own capacity to transport cargo by river – the cheapest and most environmentally friendly type of transportation. The market of cargo river transportation is 6.5 million tons per year and has all chances to triple by 2020. However, the development is limited by the lack of effective regulation of this sector.
What legislative initiatives will allow the river transportation market to fully operate for the country’s economy? What sources of funding will be most effective for the development of the river sector? How to remove unnecessary barriers, reduce business costs and implement the best world’s practices in the market?
The state, business representatives and market participants with try to find answers at the Roundtable “Development of the market of cargo river transportation in Ukraine” in Kyiv on September 12.
The event will be attended by:
Volodymyr Omelyan, Minister of Infrastructure of Ukraine
Berend de Groot, Head of Cooperation programs of the EU Representative Office in Ukraine
Dmytro Shymkiv, Deputy Head of the Presidential Administration
Andriy Shklyar, Head of the Consultative Department of the Centre for Transport Strategies
Oleksiy Honcharuk, BRDO Head
Taras Slobodyanyuk, Head of Transport Sector, BRDO
Oleksandra Klitina, Director of Reform Support Team at the Ministry of Infrastructure of Ukraine
Hans van der Werff, inland waterway sector expert of the Netherlands embassy
Hlib Strigunenko, Policy Advisor to the EU Fund for Support of Reforms / Technical Assistance
Adam Whiteman, US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Technical Assistance
Udo Vitulsky, Project Manager of the EU Inland Waterways Technical Assistance Project
Albert Bergonzo, inland waterway sector expert, Egis Ukraine
Business, public, expert and media representatives
The Better Regulation Delivery Office (BRDO) conducted a rolling review of the quality of market regulation, the results of which will be presented in an analytical study – the Green Paper “Cargo transportations by inland waterways of Ukraine”. Details at www.regulation.gov.ua.
Join the dialogue! Discussion results will be used as the basis to develop particular legislative changes in the market.
The event’s agenda is available here.
Venue: Kyiv, IQ Business Center (13-15, Bolsunovska St.)
Time: 10:00 – 12:00, September 12, 2017
You can register here. Additional information is available by phone: 063 440 47 07.
Media accreditation at [email protected] or by tel. 099 256 59 56.
The Ministry of Economic Development and Trade and the State Regulatory Service with the assistance of BRDO are the initiators of the regulatory reform in Ukraine. The project is supported by the EU as part of the EU4Business / FORBIZ initiative.
The Public Dialogue between the government and businesses aims to improve the state regulation and the business climate in Ukraine.
Buying apartments in new buildings is like a lottery. Will this building be finished or will you lose your money? Today we are one step closer to a calm sleep. The Verkhovna Rada Committee on Construction supported the inclusion of the draft law “On Protection of Property Rights of Construction Investors” on the agenda. The document was developed jointly by experts of the BRDO, the Ministry of Economic Development, the Ministry of Justice, the Secretariat of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Construction with the involvement of market and banking sector experts.
When presenting the draft law in the committee, the BRDO Head Oleksiy Honcharuk noted that in Ukraine, there are more than 200 thousand scammed families who have invested money, but haven’t receive any housing. In Ukraine, 20% of contracts show violation and fictitious features: multiple resale of the same apartment, non-compliance with design documents by real estate developers, lack of ownership rights for future apartments. The adoption of the draft law “On Protection of Property Rights of Construction Investors” will protect Ukrainians and stop fraudulent schemes. The draft law will resolve the issue of the creation and protection of rights to real estate under construction and allow banks to provide cheaper loans for the construction of real estate. As a result, real estate will be cheaper and it will be safe to invest.
[gview file=”https://brdo.com.ua/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Zakonoproekt-Majnovi-Prava-Prezentatsiya-05.09.2017-1-1.pptx”]
Entrepreneurs need 225 days to register a land plot for real estate facilities in Odesa. In Vinnitsa, the same procedures take only 93 days. Why is there such a difference in the registration of documents? How to change this?
Answers to these and other questions will be given at the presentation, which will be held in the Ukraine Crisis Media Center (2, Khreshchatyk St., Kyiv) on Thursday, September 7, 2017, at 14:30.
The presentation will be attended by:
Representatives of ministries and departments, regional state administrations, local authorities, expert and public organizations, mass media are invited to participate in the event.
More details:
+38 050 850 96 66 Larisa Tyshchenko
Accreditation of media representatives is required until 11:00 am on September 7.
Contact person: Valeriya Nahorna, tel.: +380 68 856 7099, e-mail: [email protected]
For reference:
Regional Doing Business is a joint project of the BRDO Office and the Union of Ukrainian Entrepreneurs (SUP). The rating characterizes the investment climate and the attractiveness of cities.
This study is based on the World Bank methodology. For the first study, we considered five areas of interaction between entrepreneurs and local authorities, namely:
The main criteria of this evaluation were “money” and “time” spent on formal procedures, as well as the number of “visits” to state government bodies/local authorities.
We assessed regional centers and Kyiv, except for the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and Sevastopol.
The presentation of the study “Ease of doing business. The rating of Ukrainian cities” will take place as part of the Days of Entrepreneurship – a series of events organized by the SUP that will be held in the largest cities of Ukraine (Kyiv, Dnipro, Lviv and Odesa) on September 3-8.
The GROU agency is the communication partner of the SUP and SUP’s Days of Entrepreneurship.
Source: epravda.com.ua.
Many entrepreneurs refuse to use cash registers because of their high price. There is a way out: soon these devices will “move on” smartphones.
A cash receipt is a document that not only records payment operations, but also provides a quality guarantee of goods and services purchased.
The refund for non-quality goods is provided on its basis.
On the other hand, a receipt serves as a guarantee that an entrepreneur honestly accounts for incomes and pays proper taxes to the state. It should be so, but…
The system of using cash registers in payment transactions is outdated and slow. It is expensive for entrepreneurs and ineffective for all parties.
According to the State Fiscal Service, there are more than 268 thousand payment transactions recorders (PTR) and more than 70 thousand business entities using them registered in Ukraine as of the beginning of 2017. About 600 enterprises and organizations provide maintenance services for cash registers.
According to experts, not less than half of retail payments are made without the PTR. The main argument of the “half-shadow” business is a high price of these devices.
According to the calculations of the State Regulatory Service, the cost of installing and servicing the PTR is almost 25 thousand hryvnas, 5 thousand of which is the PTR cost and the rest – the cost of materials, maintenance, transferring data to the SFS through acquirer companies, staff training, in the first year of use.
Reloading or PTR without waste paper
It is possible to create a simple and clear legal framework in the PTR area. We offer three steps that will greatly simplify these procedures.
Firstly, it is necessary to simplify the registration procedure of cash registers as much as possible. An entrepreneur buys the device, and a seller registers the equipment in the SRS electronically. This will allow to save both time and money.
Secondly, it’s time to revise technical requirements for cash registers. The existing regulatory framework was adopted 15 years ago, when there were other technologies, and the most of payment transactions were carried out in cash. Modern technologies allow reducing the price of cash registers twice, up to $100, such models already exist.
Thirdly, it is necessary to simplify the reporting and refuse to duplicate it. Now cash registers are coupled with paper reports, a record book, in which a cashier should make records every day, certify them with a signature and a stamp. SFS inspectors check just the hand-written paper books.
Given that reporting is already submitted electronically, it is time to get rid of waste paper. A record paper book should be used in cases of force majeure, when there is no electricity or Internet.
These three proposals can be implemented in the regulatory framework by the government’s decision that will accelerate the system reloading. Actually, the BRDO Office is currently engaged in this activity.
Digitalization or PTR in smartphones
Today, cash reports are sent via information acquirers – the companies, which receive reports from cash registers, and then send them to the SFS. These companies earn about 100 million hryvnas per year. We propose to start using a system, when the data from cash registers is sent directly to the SFS. It is technically possible.
How will this work? Due to using a certified reliable data storage device and an electronic digital signature to store and send fiscal data through a sim-card in the PTR fiscal units.
In this case, it is guaranteed that the possibility of destroying or changing data on transactions performed in the PTR is excluded. In addition, there will be no need for intermediaries.
In such a scenario, the PTR cost for businesses will go down to zero. There will be no need to buy any hardware or program; it will be enough to download a mobile application from the Fiscal Service’s website and you will have a cash register in your smartphone.
It will also allow to keep an eye on the staff and use the digital PTR as a marketing tool. For example, to “couple” cash receipts with contests or promotions.
This approach is not a new one, it has been tested by a number of European countries. PTRs in a smartphone are used in Canada, Romania, Hungary, Croatia, Czech Republic, and Kazakhstan. Ukraine is in a position to be included in this list and make the PTRs simple, cheap and affordable. For this purpose, there are two working groups established in the Cabinet of Ministers.
We hope that in 2017 we will see changes that will lead to more civilized and modern business doing practices. We hope that soon we will not hear: “We do not install cash registers, because we do not have 5 thousand hryvnas”.
On September 1, the “non-trade” part of the Association Agreement enters into force, according to which Ukraine should gradually harmonize its laws with the EU legislation.
Nobody in Ukraine has thoroughly studied what economic effect the implementation of this part of the Agreement would have. Ukraine has chosen the association regardless of consequences, because we have a huge credit of trust to the European integration. However, the content of the Agreement means both potential extraordinary opportunities and a significant danger. The EU legislation is very complicated and demanding, its unprofessional implementation can potentially have a negative impact on both the economy and public interests. In addition, politicians too often have a desire to justify their mistakes or corruption interests by the European integration.
“The BRDO Office often deals with the provisions of the Agreement in its activity. Our fundamental position is that it is always necessary to carefully study and weigh where and in which areas the Agreement provides Ukraine with the opportunity to maneuver or choose between different options in order to choose the most appropriate option in terms of interests of our country. It is also important to do this to prevent discrediting the European integration process in the eyes of our people. It is good that the EU provides us with the maximum possible support in the implementation process, and we are sincerely grateful for this,” the Deputy Head of BRDO Denis Malyuska said.
The detailed interview can be found at http://espreso.tv.