President: Ukraine demonstrates economic stability and changes the environment for business
17.12.2018 21:00 | Press office of President
President Petro Poroshenko reminded that Ukraine had already fulfilled a series of reforms that must be introduced as part of the implementation of the action plan for introducing the visa-free regime with the European Union for Ukrainians. However, according to the President, the reform of the country does not stop there and the changes continue. In particular, this also applies to decentralization, in the implementation of which Ukraine was assisted by Polish, German and other European partners. The Head of State said this during a meeting with the lecturers and students of Dnipro.
"Ukraine fulfills all the tasks planned. We have now received € 500 million of macro-financial assistance from the European Union at very low rates. This is the financial support for the reforms by the European Union," Petro Poroshenko stressed.
According to the President, Ukraine will also receive the first tranche of the World Bank by the end of the year. And this is also a support for our reforms.
The Head of State expressed hope that Ukraine will get the decision of IMF Board of Governors on the provision of the next tranche. "And when this happens, our gold and currency reserves will approach 20 billion," he added.
"This is stability of the national currency and stability of the economy, stability of the banking system," Petro Poroshenko emphasized.
According to him, in the first half of this year Ukraine exported goods and services to the EU for 11 billion 200 million dollars. "And we will further deepen this cooperation," the President said, adding that the EU's share in trade turnover is increasing and now it exceeds 42% and approaches 50%.
"This is a reliable market that nobody will close for us. And you can be sure about your own future. And let Russia sit with its embargo," the Head of State said. He recalled that Russia had introduced an embargo before the beginning of the hybrid war against Ukraine on Ukrainian products of the metallurgical, agrarian, chemical industries, etc. "And then it just imposed an embargo on everything and blocked the supply of gas," Petro Poroshenko said.
"The reasons for the embargo are political ones. The reasons for the embargo -they want to put the Ukrainian nation on its knees," he also noted.
The President stressed that despite the enormous expenditure on defense, we had found a way out of the crisis and an opportunity to attract investors and work on the development of the economy. "This was facilitated by the deep and comprehensive free trade area (with the European Union - ed.), the purification of the banking system," he said.
"We are decisively changing the business environment," Petro Poroshenko emphasized and reminded that Ukraine had reached the 71st place in the World Bank's Doing business rating.