Ukrainian Trade Association to ask authorities to seek ways to bring sector out of crisis
Kyiv, December 2 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The Ukrainian Trade Association plans to ask the government and the Ukrainian president to jointly draw up mechanisms to support the sector in conditions of economic crisis, the association's director general, Ihor Kishko, said at a press conference at Interfax-Ukraine on Monday.
"Our next step will be an address to the cabinet and president with a request to sit at a roundtable and consider carefully our problems [so as] to draw up common mechanisms for overcoming the crisis," he said.
Kishko said that reasonable access to credits to trade chains should be provided to stabilize the situation in the trade sector.
"Credits, which are more expensive than 15%, prevent a business from developing," he said.
The president of the association said the head of the supervisory council of CJSC Furshet, Ihor Balenko, in turn, said that today banks are canceling credit-overdrafts without warning.
"The second factor is a smart taxation policy, the third is our national customs service… a rise in the customs duties in the conditions of the financial crisis will lead only to the suppression of competition, to the weakening of the sphere," the director general of the association said.
The board chairman of Palmira Group, Vladyslav Nechai, said that the failure to settle the above-mentioned issues would lead to a fall in the range of products in the chains and dismissals of employees. He said that today around 3-5 million of people are engaged in the retail trade.
According to a press release drawn for the press conference, in November commodity turnover in Ukrainian foodstuff chains fell by 10-15% compared to October 2008, and in construction materials shops – by around 8%, and household appliances chains – by over 20%.