The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine adopted a law on the redirection of UAH 2 billion from the State Regional Development Fund to increase defense capability, member of the Holos faction Yaroslav Zhelezniak said on Telegram.
Relevant bill No. 9165 was supported by 238 MPs at the plenary session on Wednesday, he said.
Head of the budget committee Roksolana Pidlasa said the law also instructed the government to provide in the budget for 2024 the opportunity for Ukrainians to choose infrastructure projects in Diia.
Earlier, she said since the Verkhovna Rada did not adopt No. 9165 as a whole due to the large number of amendments, and there was little time left until the end of the year for the full implementation of regional infrastructure projects, the committee proposed to send these funds to the Armed Forces of Ukraine. This is about the development, purchase, modernization and repair of weapons, military equipment, facilities and equipment.
According to her, the 2023budget provides for UAH 2 billion for government investment projects of regional development, while UAH 4.5 billion was allocated in 2021, and UAH 5.2 billion in 2022.
Pidlasa said the committee initially proposed to divide these funds between the regions as follows: UAH 41.7 million each for regions that were less affected by shelling and/or occupation and Kyiv; some UAH 132.6 million each for the more affected regions: Donetsk, Kherson, Zaporizhia, Mykolaiv, Kyiv, Sumy, Kharkiv, Chernihiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Odesa, Zhytomyr.
The committee proposed to support small communities, giving them the opportunity to co-finance only 10% of the project cost, and the rest some 50%.
