Petro Melnyk: Ukraine can win not only the war with russia, but also win the fight against corruption
“Despite the large number of problems in the agricultural sector today, there are also positive trends, in particular, in the fight against corruption,” said Petro Melnyk, executive director of Agricom Group and president of UCAB, during a report at the Cambridge International Symposium on Economic Crime.
Today, the Ukrainian agricultural sector is suffering from the consequences of a full-scale war started by russia, and is fighting for the opportunity to continue its activities. In addition, over the past three months we have also had additional factors that complicate the functioning of the agricultural sector:
- stopping the grain corridor;
- embargo on the export of some agricultural products by 5 neighboring countries;
- reduction of prices for Ukrainian products.
All these factors significantly affect the agriculture of Ukraine, so even according to optimistic forecasts next year, about 20% of agricultural companies may go bankrupt.
At the same time, we can observe some positive changes in the fight against corruption.
For example, last year there were cases when some companies faced with problems of corruption in the tax sphere had a successful solution to the situation, and the corrupt individuals were released.
However, some problems with corruption are still observed, but they can be solved. In particular, by continuing to work towards transparent state and business activity. For example, this will be facilitated by the introduction of registers and special services that will exclude personal meetings between businesses and auditors. And a lot of work has already been done on this path, in particular, to reduce the number of accounting documents required from agribusiness.
In addition, there are misunderstandings on the part of state bodies: not at the highest level, because among the management there are many people who came from business and understand the specifics and problems, and, in particular, there are big problems at the regional level, when employees carry out the instructions of the management of regional divisions even when such actions are outside the legal field.
For example, there are situations in which tax inspectors during the audit of a company have an order to issue a fine that is not legal, and they know about it because they are advised to go to court. However, the court is a long process that significantly affects the conduct of business and causes significant financial costs.
In general, today I see positive changes for the better, so Ukraine can win not only in the war with russia, but also win the fight against corruption.