ARMA screens 250,000 sq m of seized warehouse space for transfer to business management – acting head
The Agency for the Recovery and Management of Assets (ARMA) is conducting an audit and verification of more than 250,000 square meters of seized warehouse space, of which approximately 60,000 square meters have already been inventoried and prepared for transfer to management, acting head of ARMA Yaroslava Maksymenko said.
This screening is being carried out in accordance with instructions from Prime Minister Serhiy Koretsky, the Ministry of Economy and Environment, ARMA, and the State Property Fund to prepare a list of warehouse spaces for large retailers and logistics companies that have been affected by Russian attacks. Earlier, during a meeting with government agencies on August 7, the head of government said that advancing European integration and supporting the economy are key priorities, and called on the agencies to work in a coordinated manner.
As Maksymenko stated in comments to Interfax-Ukraine during the public event "ARMA: Reform Opens Opportunities" in Kyiv on Tuesday, the screening is intended to assess the technical condition of the facilities, the availability of access roads, the status of seized properties, and their actual use in order to formulate proposals for businesses.
"We are currently awaiting a meeting with the business community or a working session where we will hear what types of warehouses businesses need, since we have wet warehouses, dry warehouses, cold storage facilities, and grain elevators…," she said.
She said the inspected facilities are located, in particular, in Odesa and Dnipropetrovsk regions. These include dry and cold storage facilities, pharmaceutical warehouses, and grain elevators. The transfer of assets will take place through public tenders for management rights, and in the near future, the agency will hold a working meeting with the business community to agree on the terms.
At the same time, the State Property Fund of Ukraine is also conducting an audit of state-owned warehouse space. As State Property Fund Chairman Dmytro Natalukha told reporters, the total area could potentially amount to several hundred thousand square meters; however, the actual condition and suitability of the facilities require inspection. Next week, the Property Fund plans to visit the regions to inspect the warehouses and is currently developing a legal framework for transferring them to the private sector, specifically through auctions or subleases from state-owned enterprises at a preferential rate of UAH 1.
According to a source at Interfax-Ukraine, this involves approximately 190,000 square meters of warehouse space in four western regions of Ukraine.
Earlier, in a comment to Interfax-Ukraine, CEO of the Bureau of Investment Programs Oleksandr Bondarenko said that distributors of imported goods may be interested in preferential leases of state-owned warehouses; but for food retailers, such an offer may not be economically viable.
"We all know the condition of the state's assets, as well as those held by ARMA and the State Property Fund. The equipment is outdated, and the facilities themselves are in poor condition-most are typically classified as "D' [the lowest quality]. Of the 190,000 square meters, at best half will be suitable for retrofitting, and about 500,000 square meters of logistics facilities were destroyed this year. So, in the most optimistic scenario, the government"s offer covers one-fifth of the need. "But the key point is that warehouses and logistics terminals are needed where the consumers are," the CEO of the Investment Programs Bureau said.