Trade & Customs

Cross-border trade is, in tandem with Foreign Direct Investment, basically the key pillar of a country’s economic growth. Its role in a state’s economic policy is pivotal, if not enabling.

No wonder that all the steps being taken towards facilitating trade are sensitive inside the country as well as beyond its borders. And the situation at the end of 2013 around EU-Ukraine Association Agreement is a perfect example of this statement. We hope that our policy makers have learnt their lessons from that crisis, as the steps being taken towards developing state trade policy and the appointment of Nataliya Mykolska (who we all know from the legal market) as Deputy Minister for Economic Development and Trade of Ukraine — Commercial representative of Ukraine, are considered promising for the country’s business environment.

As a member of the WTO, Ukraine has at its disposal a broad set of measures for action to defend its economic interests and position on world markets. This means that a lot of work should be done on both fronts — at home and at the international level. The involvement of real business in formulating strategy and technicalities of the relevant road map is merely the first (but very important) requirement for streamlining this sensitive policy in a neat and tidy manner.

Our second to last issue in this year that is drawing to a close, takes a look at numerous operational things regarding the ordinary life of export/import players. We also attempt to catch up on developments surrounding execution of contracts, recent disputes and provide our traditional analysis of legislation.

Happy reading,

Olga Usenko