The members of the Ukrainian Agri Council, Volia LLC and Zolotonoskyi Bekon LLC in Cherkasy region, may become bankrupts in the near future. This is due to the actions of law enforcement officers who opened a criminal case and blocked the accounts of the companies.

At 8 a.m. on June 7, about 50 police and SSU officers came to the houses of the owners and directors and to the administrative buildings of Volia LLC and Zolotoniskyi Bekon LLC, both part of the Time group. They conducted searches, seized documents, confiscated cash from an employee, and arrested the companies' accounts. The reason was a criminal case in which law enforcement suspects the owners of two agricultural companies of state funds appropriation.

Independent development

For more than 10 years, the two agricultural enterprises had been operating and developing successfully. Before the current owners bought Volia LLC in 2010, the farm was in decline, several production areas had already been closed, and only a few grain crops were harvested. Today, the farm has 2,500 hectares under cultivation, 900 hectares of which are under irrigation and 500 hectares under vegetables. The farm employs over 150 people. Last year, the company transferred more than UAH 13 million to the budgets of various levels and more than UAH 5 million in the first half of 2023. Zolotonosha Bacon LLC has more than 70,000 pigs, which are looked after by more than 120 employees. Last year, total tax payments to the budget amounted to almost UAH 6 million and almost UAH 7 million for the first 6 months of 2023.

Refrigerator for storing potatoes, Volia LLC

In October 2021, Volia LLC completed the construction of a 15,000-ton potato storage facility, and at the end of 2020, Zolotoniskyi Bekon LLC completed the construction of a feed storage elevator and fattening complex. The total cost of the potato storage facility amounted to over UAH 36 million, the grain storage facility - UAH 27 million, and the fattening complex - UAH 41.7 million. The facilities were put into operation and then received state support under the construction cost reimbursement program from the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine. The state reimbursed UAH 18 million for the potato refrigerator, almost UAH 12 million for the grain storage facility, and UAH 14.7 million for the fattening complex. The elevator is actually a part of the future corn processing plant with a capacity of 100,000 tons per year. The total investment amount is UAH 180 million, which will create an additional 70 workplaces. The plant's products will be used for its own needs, sold on the domestic market, and exported immediately.

Grain storage facility, Grunveh LLC.

In addition, the largest millet production facility among the former Soviet Union countries is being built at the subsidiary of Zolotoniskyi Bekon LLC, Grunveh LLC. The total investment amount is UAH 96 million. The factory will create 50 workplaces. It is almost completed and was supposed to be launched in August 2023.

Due to the actions of law enforcement agencies, the construction of all facilities has been frozen.

The fattening complex of Grunveh LLC

State "support"

A few years after the construction was completed, the police decided that three facilities for which they had received state reimbursement for construction costs had not been put into operation. They opened a criminal case and came to investigate at the end of the last week. When, during the searches, they were shown documents proving the completion of construction in accordance with all standards of all three facilities, the investigators decided to ignore this fact, continued the searches and finally blocked the accounts of two farms.

"Volia LLC grows vegetables, and this year we added watermelons, onions and cucumber. Most of our products are shipped to Kyiv. Now we can't pay for utilities, buy fertilizers, or invest. Without paying for electricity for irrigation, we will lose hundreds of thousands of tons of vegetables, which is a crime given the shortage of these products due to the war in Kherson region. The situation is even worse at Zolotoniskyi Bekon LLC. Every week we buy feed for tens of thousands of pigs. At the beginning of this week, we have to make payments to suppliers to feed the animals. Without feed, we will end up with 70,000 dead pigs," said Yurii Tkachenko, co-founder of the farms.

He added that the construction of all the facilities, in which millions of hryvnias have been invested and which were supposed to start operating in the near future, creating new jobs, has been stopped.

Blind investigation

According to the companies' lawyer, Serhiy Barilov, these arguments of the co-founder, as well as the fact that the facilities had long been put into operation and had passed the relevant inspections of the commissions of the Ministry of Agrarian Policy to receive compensation, did not convince law enforcement officers. Moreover, the court's search warrant authorized the seizure of only documents dated after 2020. Nevertheless, law enforcement officers, in their opinion, also seized all the cash from the employee of Zolotoniskyi Bekon LLC.

"There were many mistakes in the search warrants, and the documents dated 2013 were seized too. On Friday evening, July 7, we found out that our accounts had been blocked. This almost paralyzed the work of the enterprises and put them on the path to a very accelerated destruction. At the same time, there is no object of the crime. Everything has been completed and put into operation," emphasized Sergiy Barilov.

The leadership of the agricultural enterprises is not against the investigation and ready to provide all the necessary documents, but emphasize that blocking the accounts will lead to rapid bankruptcy.

"We are ready to defend our rights in court. They could have just come and made sure that the facilities were completed, instead of stopping production and organizing "circus" at enterprises and in private houses, scaring children. During the searches, I had a strong feeling that we were back in the days of Yanukovych," said Yuriy Tkachenko, co-founder of the farms.

Position of the UAC

The Ukrainian Agri Council condemns the actions of law enforcement agencies. This is not the first case of law enforcement pressure on an agricultural enterprise that managed to receive state support. It is unacceptable to block the work of agricultural enterprises that ensure the country's food security during the war. Especially if the basis is unfounded accusations.

We urge to lift the freeze on the accounts of Volia LLC and Zolotoniskyi Bekon LLC to preserve their operations. These companies have been operating in the Ukrainian market for a long time, have an excellent business reputation and are actively helping the Army at the front. The UAC will actively monitor the situation around these two companies.

As a reminder, the UAC recently appealed to People’s Deputy Halyna Yanchenko, Head of the Temporary Special Commission of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine on Investor Protection, with a request to take all possible measures to stop the unjustified criminal prosecution of DK VET LLC, AF Mayak LLC and their officials.