KYIV. Sept 27 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The co-owner of MAFIA, CASTA, Georgia, BAO, NAM (Kyiv), Brilliant Bar, Yakitoriya (Kharkiv) restaurant chains, Taras Serediuk, has announced plans to vaccinate about 90% of employees of his establishments against COVID-19 by November.

"We have a plan: by the end of October we have a clear schedule, for which the head of the restaurant and the COO of the chain are responsible, KPI, where the key performance indicator is the number of vaccinated. We will bring this percentage to above 80% for sure, closer to 90%," he said at a press conference "How the restaurant business will work during COVID restrictions" at the Interfax-Ukraine agency.

According to Oleksandr Savilov, the CEO and co-owner of the Salateira fast-healthy restaurants chain, in the capital, the level of vaccinated employees exceeds the indicators in the regions. This is due to the lack of mobile vaccination teams outside of Kyiv.

"There are restaurants with a 100% vaccination rate for employees, and there are restaurants with a 20% vaccination rate, especially in the regions. There are three mobile teams working in Kyiv specifically working with Kyiv restaurants. In the regions - Kharkiv, Lviv, Odesa, Dnipro - there is no such a thing," he said.

According to the members of the National Restaurant Association of Ukraine, the authorities should ensure the availability of mobile teams to vaccinate employees and customers of restaurants in order to enable the business to continue working under quarantine restrictions.

According to the association, 12.5 million people visit restaurants in Ukraine every month.

The association unites about 400 restaurants in the country.