Agrarian showcase is starting
The Cabinet of Ministers still hasn’t decided on the issue of selling land to foreigners. Some 70 percent of farmers are against “strangers”
In Kyiv the Second International Agrarian Investment Forum “The World Food Security: Challenges and Investment Opportunities for the Agrarian Sector,” organized according to the program of the international exhibit AGRO-2011, has come to an end. Many foreign VIP-guests visited the forum this year. Ministers of agriculture from Latvia and Lithuania, Romania, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Estonia, Belarus, Bulgaria, Hungary, Russia... as well as directors of the Investment Center of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the World Bank in Ukraine, the American Chamber of Commerce, the European Business Association and representatives of other foreign companies and banks visited the Ukrainian exhibit.
While opening the forum, the Minister for Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine Mykola Prysiazhniuk stressed that the constant growth of the population and price increases for food products make all countries unite in solving this burning problem.
At the same time, Ukraine itself can play an extremely important role in guaranteeing global food security, said the director of the Investment Center of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization Charles Riemenschneider. For this, according to him, it is necessary to increase investments in Ukraine. In the world since 2004 the average crop capacity of agrarian cultures has increased by 26 percent, while in Ukraine it has decreased by two percent. Stable and predictable policy in the agrarian sector is also needed. “Ukraine must prove that it can be a reliable exporter,” he specified. The FAO representative reminded that in 2008 Ukraine provided seven percent of the world grain supply. By the way, this statement coincided with the government’s canceling of grain crops export restrictions. It looks as though the government decided to pursue a preemptive tactic and persuade foreign VIP-guests that we have market state methods of the agricultural complex management.
In addition, during the forum the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine and the federal minister of animal resources and fishery of the Republic of Sudan signed the memorandum on mutual understanding. “Ukraine and Sudan will cooperate in the field of cattle breeding, technologies for production of cattle breeding and poultry raising products, design and building of farms, veterinary medicine and veterinary service, production of forage and animals fattening, fishery and processing of livestock raising products, milk and meat,” Prysiazhniuk specified.
It looks that behind all these official activities, the head of the Ukrainian Agrarian Confederation Leonid Kozachenko shares his impressions with The Day about the forum, one more goal is seen: before the big land reform the Ukrainian government announced, holding the forum looks like a start of agrarian showcase of Ukraine for potential investors. And this is normal, Kozachenko supposes, one should advertise oneself, because the potential of the Ukrainian agricultural sector is simply too impressive.
Foreign guests had an opportunity to verify firsthand the attractiveness of the Ukrainian agrarian sector. However, the answer to the question everyone was interested in, about the ownership right to agricultural land, did not come. It can be explained by the fact that it looks that the authorities haven’t yet decided on the final version of the land reform. As Ukraine’s Prime Minister Mykola Azarov said in his commentary for The Day, currently the maximal process of discussing who can really buy Ukrainian agricultural land is ongoing. “Even among those involved in the elaboration there is no distinct and clear answer to this question,” Azarov explained and added: “In my opinion, on this stage our land shouldn’t be sold to foreigners. We see what a big potential for increasing production on its land Ukraine has. We have enough domestic investors.” And when food prices constantly grow in the world and land becomes a strategic resource, it is wrong, prime minister supposes, to hand this resource over to someone.
In the meanwhile, Vice Speaker of the parliament Mykola Tomenko supposes that in Ukraine the severe monopolization of the land market by big financial and industrial groups has already started. This representative of the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc points out that “the information we receive from the regions exhibits two dangerous symptoms that the land reform will take place anyway.” According to him, small owners and farmers often have no wish to renew their land lease. The other risk is, in his opinion, that today catalogs of poor people, who are ready to immediately sell their land shares if a decision on selling land after respective amendments in the legislation are being compiled in parliament.
However, the government has its own arguments regarding the future of the land reform. In the opinion of Mykola Azarov, the population must say the final word on what to do with the land. “The discussion (regarding the final land sale. – Author) first of all must concern the people working on land. Above all, agrarians must answer this question,” he summarized.
The Horshenin Institute has studied the sentiments of farmers. As the expert of this institution Maryna Tkachenko told The Day, during the survey on the topic “Social and Economic Conditions of Modern Ukrainian Village” it turned out that almost 70 percent of those surveyed are against making land a commodity. “At this, traditional agricultural regions are the most consistent in this issue: central (84 percent) and eastern Ukraine (76.6 percent). At the same time, 16.6 percent of respondents support free land market. The majority of the surveyed agrarians (60.3 percent) cultivate their land by themselves today, and only 20 percent let it out; 66.2 percent gave a negative answer to the question whether farmers want to work at agricultural enterprises,” the expert says. “The Ukrainian village isn’t ready for land reform,” Tkachenko concludes. Farmers are restrained from taking up market rules of the game by the big unemployment rate, high migration rate, the absence of stability today and the premonition of improvement of the situation in the agricultural complex tomorrow, she adds.
