On February 13 the Union of Ukrainian Entrepreneurs participated in a working meeting with President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
The focus of the meeting was how to make Ukraine attractive for investments.
“Ukraine needs investments but for some reason the State’s attention is focused on attracting only external investors. At the same time the potential of companies already operating in Ukraine, which have already been investing and are ready to invest in the future, is greatly underestimated,” said the Executive Director of SUP Kateryna Glazkova.
Thus, the companies united by the Union of Ukrainian Entrepreneurs have invested over $ 2.3 billion since 2015, and $ 490 million last year alone. And this is only for the construction of new facilities – factories from scratch, new production facilities, modern logistics centers.
“Today it is clear that the promised economic growth by 7% will not happen. Obviously, the steps taken before are not enough – it is necessary to look for additional drivers of growth. Such drivers can be: reducing the burden on the payroll, exit capital tax, current labor legislation, the land market and improved infrastructure”, – said the President of SUP Vyacheslav Klimov.
The SUP representatives called for the implementation of mechanisms and changes that would stimulate investment in development, create new jobs, and pay taxes.
These are some key proposals of SUP:
1. Tax reform, which will include:
- exit capital tax (from 2021, but only if it is provided to all companies).
- reducing the burden on the payroll to 25% (single social contribution + income tax).
- strengthening the personal responsibility of the representatives of the controlling bodies. Today taxpayers do not even comply with the court’s decision to unblock unreasonably blocked tax bills. And no one is punished for either an unjustified decision or a failure to comply with a court’s decision.
- the tax agent is the person who will increase the self-awareness of citizens as taxpayers.
- increasing the value of business for local authorities and taxpayers in general. Intergovernmental budget reform would help keep all local business taxes left in local budgets. Then we would receive hundreds of investment nannies such as mayors, heads of territorial communities, local deputies.
2. Improvement of infrastructure.
And it is not just about new roads, private traction. It is necessary to look for mechanisms that will make the connection of objects to infrastructure networks transparent and predictable, both in pricing and in the order in which they are connected.
In the context of the meeting SUP raised the questions about Law No. 1210. Besides a few positive rules, it contains a number of negative burdensome business innovations and is perceived by members of the SUP as a harmful law for the country’s economy. Representatives present at the meeting assured that the final version of the document does not contain any negative rules. However none of the business associations present at the meeting saw the final document.
Among the positive steps taken by the authorities the Union pointed out a decrease of NBU’s key policy rate to 11%, steps to open the land market and openness and involvement of business in the work on labor law.
We thank the President for his open dialogue and willingness to listen to the business proposals!
