Ukraine will receive macro-financial aid from the European Union

Today, Vice President of the European Commission Valdis Dombrovskis, acting Minister of Finance Oksana Markarova and Head of the National Bank of Ukraine Yakiv Smoliy have signed a memorandum and a loan agreement between Ukraine and the European Union stipulating macro-financial aid to Ukraine from the European Union amounting 1 billion euros. The signing ceremony was attended by President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko and Prime Minister of Ukraine Volodymyr Groysman.

Following this, the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs will soon jointly submit a proposal to the President of Ukraine to immediately present a draft law on the ratification of these international agreements to the Parliament.

“I am thankful to the European partners for their quick and constructive action in implementing the new macro-financial aid program of the EU for Ukraine”, said acting Minister of Finance of Ukraine Oksana Markarova.

According to the acting Minister of Finance, the macro-financial aid of the EU to Ukraine amounting 2.81 billion euros, which was provided in three previous programs, contributed both the stabilization of Ukraine’s financial system and to the intensification of reforms in Ukraine. The signing of the new Memorandum and the Loan Agreement is an extremely important step to preserve the macro-economic stability of Ukraine.

According to the signed Agreement, the macro-financial aid will be divided in two tranches amounting 500 million euros each. The first tranche is expected to be transferred to Ukraine this autumn, as soon as the agreement parties have completed their internal procedures for the validation of the signed documents and Ukraine has fulfilled the terms for the first tranche.

The second tranche shall be transferred in the spring of 2019 after the evaluation of Ukraine’s performance in reforming agreed sectors of the national policy.

For information: as part of the cooperation between Ukraine and the EU, three macro-financial aid (loan) programs of the EU were implemented by the parties in the period from 2014 till 2017. Under these programs Ukraine received 2.81 billion euros: 1.36 billion in 2014, 850 million in 2015 and 600 million in 2017. The conditions for this aid include good governance and fight against corruption, effective public finance management, privatization, reform of the management of state-owned companies, corporate management in state-owned banks and banking supervision, reform of the energy sector, healthcare and social welfare reforms.