Since 2001, the process of land market opening has been stagnating. This opinion was expressed by the General Director of the Association "Ukrainian Agribusiness Club" on December 4 at the conference “Towards an open and grounded land reform”.

The event was organized by the World Bank Project “Support for Agricultural and Land Reforms in Ukraine” with the participation of the IMF, the EU, Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine, Ministry of Finance of Ukraine, Ministry of Justice of Ukraine, the National Bank, people's deputies and active participants in the land reform process.

During the event Taras Vysotskyi spoke about the impact of the land reform on agricultural investment and the steps to be taken to attract them.

“In the course of the political debate that have continued 16 years, we deviated from the course and forgot about the main task of the land reform of 1991. The purpose of the land relations transformation was the land denationalization and creation of new private forms of management based on former collective farms. During the first ten years of the reforms from 1991 to 2001, 26.4 mln hectares of land were distributed on land shares, which amounted half (48.2%) of the country's agricultural land. Rent for land shares in 2000 exceeded UAH 1.6 bln. At the end of 2001, only 1.8% of the land was in collective ownership”, - said Taras Vysotskyi.

Since the beginning of 2001, land reform has been stagnating. Over the next 15 years only 25% of the land has been privatized, the number of farms has decreased by 11%, in comparison with 2001. The State Land Cadastre still remains unfilled, the level of land ownership protection is low. Unresolved issues of collective land ownership, unclaimed land shares, field roads, etc.

“At present, unfortunately, we don’t have any revival of investment processes in the industry, because the reform isn’t complete yet. The reasons why the moratorium had to be introduced for the first time due to the ineffectiveness of the reform were announced in the Presidential Decree dated May 30, 2001: the proper legislative framework wasn’t created; the mechanism of free turnover of land shares and mortgage lending weren’t formed, there was no proper financing of the reform” - noted the General Director of UCAB.

According to the expert, in order to ensure the effectiveness of the reform, it is necessary to complete what began in 2001. For this, it is necessary to implement 4 conditions: 

- to enhance the legal framework for the development of land relations in agriculture;

- to improve the efficiency of state management of land resources;

- to create land market and lending of land;

- the filling the State Land Cadastre and ensuring the monitoring and evaluation of land.

“The past 15 years attest to the lack of systematic reform implementation. The analysis of the land reform from 1991 showed that even in the 90's, the pace and steps were faster than in the next 15 years. What managed to be privatized in the nineties - gave the incentive for attracting investment in the 2000s and the growth of the agricultural sector.  In the following 15 years, no further steps were taken. What needs to be done today? Ensure the functioning of high-quality regulatory framework and introduce the turnover of agricultural land. The availability of these two factors will lead to favorable conditions for attracting investment. Most decisions are already prepared by the expert environment. But it is necessary to do one big political step to open the land market, because without it all other efforts will not be enough”, - summed up Taras Vysotskyi.