Last year’s production volume by national manufacturing enterprises remained by 18 percent lower than that of 2013, and by 22 percent lower than 2012 production volume. Given this continuous industrial crisis, OPPOSITION PLATFORM — FOR LIFE MP Serhiy Lovochkin filed an inquiry to Ukraine’s Prime Minister Volodymyr Hroisman asking to develop and implement a strategy of manufacturing industry revival.

“I demand urgent measures aimed at development and implementation of a long-term strategy for manufacturing industry growth, including countermeasures against abovementioned negative factors, as well as priorities and mechanisms of the state support for national manufacturing industry,” Lovochkin stated.

The inquiry reads that insignificant growth of manufacturing industry, recorded last year, is within statistical error and is explained mostly with low comparison base and favorable external situation. However, even so, the last year’s production volume by local industrial manufacturers was by 18 percent lower than that of 2013, and by 22 percent poorer by the 2012 indicator.

The politician says that given this statistics, with the government’s agenda for industrial sector and current growth rates of the sector, it will not be able to recover its 2013 production level until 2037. Moreover, the forecast will deteriorate even further if external trading conditions change.

Lovochkin cited the following data: in 2018, industrial manufacturing slid in nine regions of Ukraine, i.e. in one third of the country. The largest deindustrialization affected the Luhansk region with its 18 percent lower production compared to 2017. The volume of good manufactured in the Luhansk region in 2018 reached only 15.5 percent of the 2013 level; the same indicator is 43 percent in the Donetsk region, 80 percent in Kyiv, 87 percent in the Dnipropetrovsk region, 89 percent in the Sumy, Chernihiv, and Poltava regions.

According to the OPPOSITION PLATFORM — FOR LIFE MP, the following industries saw shortened manufacturing volumes in 2018: electrical engineering by 18 percent, consumer goods industry by 5 percent, and food industry by 2 percent. Last year’s manufacturing rates look even poorer if compared to the 2013 level (without Crimea and the anti-terrorist operation area): metallurgical production shortened by 27.4 percent, electrical goods by 27 percent, motor vehicles by 68 percent, engines and cars by 56 percent; coal mining by 56 percent, metallic ores by almost 17 percent, oil and gas by 6.3 percent; chemical recovery goods production decreased by 39 percent, fuel and energy production by 19 percent, including electrical power by 20.4 percent, and gas production & distribution by 32 percent.

“The situation is extremely grave in high-tech manufacturing industries that used to be Ukraine’s ‘signature sectors’ and its ‘development engines.’ However, these sectors are now next to ruining. First, this can be said about the aviation sector with its three plants producing no more than one or two planes and having no multiple orders over the past four years. Vessel building sector is facing the same situation: its production has reduced to maintenance and painting work over the past several years. Automotive and rocket industry enterprises are under similar conditions,” the inquiry reads.

“Experts are certain that Ukraine’s manufacturing industry will continue deteriorating well into 2019. The major reason is lack of professional and efficient measures by the government, aimed at reducing a number of systemic factors or minimization of their influence,” Lovochkin stated.