A series of online conferences in the regions with representatives of agribusiness, the StateGeoCadastre, line ministries, and local government has started from Volyn region.

The online meetings are a part of a project to support the reform of the StateGeoCadastre by agribusiness and rural communities of Ukraine, implemented by the UAC with the support of USAID AGRO Project, the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Agriculture of Ukraine and the State Agency for Agriculture.

"The purpose of the project is to create a national platform for discussing problematic issues of the land legislation, overcoming corruption and raiding, expanding business participation in the formation and implementation of the state policy in the field of land relations. Carrying out institutional reform of the StateGeoCadastre,” the UAC Director on Regional Development Olha Chuveieva said.

Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine Roman Leshchenko, Deputy Minister of Economic Development, Trade and Agriculture Taras Vysotskyi, Head of the USAID Land Reform Program welcomed the participants for Agricultural and Rural Development (AGRO) Serhii Kubakh.

Minister Roman Leshchenko mentioned that the issue of land reform in Ukraine, which had been going on for 30 years, was politicized too much, especially in the issue of lifting the moratorium on the circulation of agricultural land. However, in reality it is a difficult path to complex and qualitative transformations.

Serhii Kubakh emphasized that the USAID AGRO program had consistently supported the development of land reform and the development of decentralization in Ukraine. He noted that the goal of the Program was to improve the agricultural sector’s management, accelerate the economic development of communities and promote the development of the land market in Ukraine.

Taras Vysotskyi mentioned that the opening of the agricultural land market was an indisputable increase in the efficiency of land use, which would allow to develop agriculture, increase the welfare of the rural sector, develop rural areas. He also noted that in the concept of land reform, the community was the basis, because it got land plots and received tools to control land usage.

USAID AGRO Legal Adviser Victor Kobylianskyi told the participants about the possible raiding surge after the land market opening and how to be protected from intruders. He also talked about the signs that could indicate the preparation of a raiding on a particular farm, acquainted with the raiding schemes and protection options.

"Any change in the rules of the game leads to a surge in raiding. Criminals will try to take advantage of some ignorance, lack of consistent case law, problems in the application of the law in order to make money. What do you need to know? Raider attacks weak enterprises, so farmers need to know their weaknesses - financial, personnel, legal, administrative ones and eliminate them. The only way to fight against raiders is to control your property through a constant audit of your own company and its registers," Viktor Kobylianskyi said.

Farmers can read the Practical Recommendations for Preventing and Counteracting Agrarian Raiding and learn how to be protected from raiding: https://bit.ly/3dWxpaJ

The UAC lawyer on land issues Victoria Kipriianova spoke about the problems in land relations that farmers faced. Issues of technical errors in the StateGeoCadastre occupy a significant part of them. These are so-called "overlays" of land plots, land plots failure in the specified place, the lack of information about the land. The expert spoke about the types of technical errors and practical ways to solve them.

“As part of this project, in recent weeks we have collected requests from the representatives of the agribusiness, real and practical problems that they have in land relations. These issues are important before the first stage of the land market, as a technical error, depending on its type, may be grounds for refusal to certify the contract of land plot sale. If such an agreement takes place, it will be a good basis for a raiding. At the same time, during the analysis of requests, we realized that the reason for some errors is the lack of good communication between land users and the StateGeoCadastre, and the reason for others - a complete lack of understanding of where to start work to eliminate the error," Victoria Kipriianova said.

The topic of eliminating technical errors in the StateGeoCadastre was continued by the First StateGeoCadastre Deputy Chairman in Volyn region Anatolii Poliakov, who supplemented the information on practical ways to solve the situation and gave real examples of the consequences of "gaps" in the StateGeoCadastre.

During the online conference, participants from the region could get answers from the specialists of the main department of the StateGeoCadastre in Volyn region.