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2.8 Polls & Sociology
In US Chamber’s annual Ukraine Business Climate Survey: 88% forecast revenue growth this year; 84% feel Ukraine’s govt committed to increasing foreign investment; 82% plan to expand business in next 5 years; 65% are increasing investments, and 64% see improved investment climate
Top obstacle for business are: courts - 74%; tax authorities - 51%; and law enforcement agencies – 48%. “Rule of law is top of the list of areas that requires urgent improvement,” says Chamber President Andy Hunder. “Ukrainian authorities should focus on further boosting IT and renewable energy. There are concerns about new legislation that could hinder further growth in these sectors.” Ukraine’s top three advantages are: skills - 51%; low labour costs – 51%; and access to the EU market - 44%. Ukraine’s most attractive investment sectors are: agriculture - 85%; IT - 73%; and energy & renewables - 45%.
A farm land market is opposed by 73% of Ukrainians polled by the Rating Sociological Group. Only 19% support allowing Ukrainians to sell their farmland. An even higher group – 81% oppose selling land to foreigners. A national referendum on the issue is backed by 81% of respondents interviewed from Sept. 28 to Oct. 1.
A joint survey by the Ukrainian KMIS and the Russian Levada Center found that 56% of Russian respondents are feeling positive towards Ukraine, the highest figure since March 2014. The rise is a very sharp one which started in late 2018. By contrast, Ukrainians’ feelings towards Russia have been gradually getting warmer since the lowest point in May 2015, with a peak in February 2019 (57% of Ukrainians felt positive towards Russia then, 54% now).
Almost half of Ukrainians believe the economy will improve over the next year, according to a survey of 2,500 people polled from Saturday to Tuesday. Of respondents, 45% believe the economy will improve over the next 12 months, 26% believe there will be no change, 15% say it will get worse, and 15% can’t say. “Against the backdrop of growing optimistic sentiments in the country after the presidential election, positive expectations about the future have also grown,” concludes the pollster, the Rating sociological group.
Ukraine backslides two places in the World Economic Forum’s 2019 Global Competitiveness Index, ranking 85th among 141 countries. Healthcare and macroeconomic stability metrics worsened, while the country improved in business dynamism and labour market metrics.
More than half of Ukrainians, 52%, do not approve of the lifting of the moratorium on agricultural land sales, according to a study conducted by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) on September 16-19. Some 35% of those surveyed are receptive to the idea seeing it in a positive light, while 13% of respondents had difficulty answering the question, according to news agency Interfax. Some 64% of respondents believe that the issue of agricultural land sale should be solved only in an all-Ukrainian referendum, and 26% believe that the issue should be resolved by the president, the Verkhovna Rada and the nation's government, while 10% of respondents could not answer the question. The survey was conducted by CATI method (computer- assisted telephone interviews) based on a random sampling of mobile phone numbers. The sample is representative of the adult population of Ukraine (18 years and older). The sample does not include territories temporarily not controlled by the authorities of Ukraine. During the survey, 1,500 interviews were conducted. The sampling error with a probability of 0.95 does not exceed 2.6%. In early September, newly elected Ukrainian Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk pledged to liberalise the nation's land market in Ukraine by the middle of the next year.
More than half of Ukrainians (56%) do not support the provision of the
15 UKRAINE Country Report November 2019 www.intellinews.com