The topic of crop loss in 2020 by agrarians of Odesa region continues to be under the UAC’s control. Currently, the Odessa Regional Council has perceived force majeure circumstance and approved the list of farms that suffered from them in 2020. This document will help farmers not to lose the status of a fixed agricultural tax payer, giving the opportunity to defer its payment.

"Farmers hoped that they would be able to cover the losses with funds from spring crops sale. This did not happen because they were also lost. They hoped that the promised state support of UAH 4-5 thousand per hectare would be allocated. This did not happen too. Farmers could not use the state programs "Affordable Loans 5-7-9" and compensation for loans. If the company is completely unprofitable, then the program "5-7-9" is refused for refinance. According to the terms of another program, at the time of submission of documents, the company should not have debts. And we have had a drought for two years. There are companies that are in the red since 2019. When farmers realized that there would be no support at all, it became clear that they would "take off" from the fixed tax and from January 1 will also become payers of income tax. Taking into account the critical situation, we began to initiate the decision of the regional council," a member of the UAC Board Alla Stoianova explained.

Affected farmers also began to receive certificates from the Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCI), which confirm the existence of force majeure circumstances in their activities. The certificate give an opportunity to avoid charging "conditional" VAT in the crop failure situation.

These results became possible with the help and assistance of the UAC’s experts. In particular, with the help of Deputy Head of the Tax Administration for Tax Policy Olha Bohdanova. Last month, she made a webinar-training, during which she provided comprehensive information on the preparation of a documents package required by farmers to submit to the CCI and the regional council, and gave a list of advices to agricultural producers throughout the obtaining documents process.