Ukrainian President: launch of land reform in the country postponed for another year
President Petro Poroshenko stated at a meeting with business representatives on Friday, December 1 that the launch of the land market will be postponed for at least a year.
"We have so far failed to break through the defense of populists, who vehemently oppose the free circulation of agricultural land but I wish to underline my fundamental political stance. I am in favor of the land market," said the President.
Poroshenko explained that it is still necessary to do related work, such as filling the electronic state land cadaster. "Look, for 25 years we have been engaged in creation of a land cadaster and have managed to complete only more than half. We cannot speak about market launch without a 100% digitization of the land cadaster," the President stressed. Poroshenko mandated the completion of the work in a year’s time.
In Ukraine, a moratorium on agricultural land trade has been in force since 2002. The Parliament has extended it on several occasions. President Petro Poroshenko, during his September message to the Verkhovna Rada, promised that he would not push the parliament to adopt land reform. However, reform will be necessary to obtain the sixth tranche of the IMF loan. The fifth tranche has not even been received yet.
The World Bank hopes that the Ukrainian government would declare land reform a priority and that the Ukrainian authorities will complete preparatory steps without delay so that the moratorium can be lifted in 2018.