A New Sieve for Foreign-Made Cars

The financial crisis seems to have suddenly made Ministry of Economics officials realize the destructiveness of their attempts to achieve stability solely through macroeconomic regulation. Inspired by this theoretical revelation, the Ministry of Industrial Policy has rushed to revive the Ukrainian car-manufacturing industry.

Naturally, at issue here is the attraction of foreign investment by providing additional tax breaks. Ukrainian taxpayers, who will supposedly drive cars manufactured on an almost competition-free basis, could probably understand our authorities' passion for domestic cars (although they all drive foreign brands anyway). But as an additional protective measure, Minister of Industrial Policy Vasyl Hureyev proposed raising customs duties for imported cars, establishing import quotas, introducing an ecological fee for foreign cars without catalysts, banning the import of used car bodies, and raising transport tax for juridical entities using foreign cars.

In his commentary to The Day concerning the government's plan, general director of the Diamatyk Center of Social and Economic Information and analyst of Ukrainian and foreign car markets Yuriy Hrebenchuk noted that the government's efforts to create a domestic car-making industry are hindered primarily by people's distrust of the country's officialdom. "When a ban on the import of cars over five years old was introduced," said Hrebenchuk, "Ukrainians started to bring them into the country in parts.  Now they may be deprived even of this chance to use inexpensive and reliable cars."