Yesterday, during a parliamentary hearing on the land reform, Minister of Economic Development, Trade and Agriculture Tymofiy Milovanov gave an outlook on Ukraine's GDP growth due to the launch of the land market.

In particular, he noted that “in the first three months of the next year alone, the market will bring about 9 billion additional hryvnias of GDP growth, which will amount to about 0.23%. In 2021, such growth will amount to 30 billion hryvnias and, accordingly, 0.83% of GDP growth”. By this time, the government was announcing very different, significantly inflated indicators of additional GDP growth from the introduction of the land market - from 1 to 4 %%. In particular, such information was provided in the newsletter of the official publication of the Cabinet of Ministers “Uryadovyy kuryer” newspaper, which was distributed in the regions.

The figures, announced by the Minister during the hearings, are in line with the forecasts and calculations of the UAC experts, which were officially announced this Tuesday during the roundtable "Land sale: Ukrainian realities and Lithuanian experience".

UAC welcomes such a step by Tymofiy Milovanov, since only providing the society with true forecasts about the economic impact of the land reform gives an opportunity to really assess its consequences and make informed decisions about its implementation.

At the same time, there’s a concern that Mr. Milovanov didn’t release the forecast data on the contribution of the land reform to GDP growth in 2022-2024, which, according to the calculations of UAC, will be negative. It should be noted that the corresponding calculations were made based on the model of the Ministry.

Tymofiy Milovanov also didn’t say that the expected growth of GDP, in the first years of reform, will be conditioned solely by the growth of consumption at the expense of the funds that shareholders will receive from the sale of land, and not by the growth of the real sector of economy and production. This is the reason for the instability and expected negative impact of the land reform on GDP growth in 2022-2024.