On September 5, Verkhovna Rada Committee on Agrarian Policy and Land Relations held a meeting on “Raiding in the agrarian sector. The activities of state authorities for preventing the agrarian enterprises take-over”, attended by representatives of UCAB Land Relations Committee.

Every year, the agrarians fall victims of attempts to take-over the crop or enterprise.  In order to prevent the unlawful seizure of property the meeting was offered a series of measures that would make it impossible to raider.

At the suggestion of the Minister of Justice of Ukraine Pavlo Petrenko, by the end of this month, according to the new rules, the registrar will not be able to complete the registration without information from the State Land Cadastre and that will prevent the possibility of a double lease agreement. In addition, the owner and tenant will have the opportunity to establish a special control in the register of property rights, which will allow to promptly keep track any registration actions for land plots. Also, since August 15, anti-raiding headquarters have begun to operate throughout Ukraine, which provide a rapid response to raider attacks. As a result of their activities, several criminal cases have already been brought against raiders. Maksym Martynyuk, the First Deputy Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food, emphasized that the profile ministry is working to ensure the interaction between the State Land Cadastre and the State Registration of Property Rights.

“Protection of land ownership rights, property complexes of enterprises and other real rights is very important for Ukrainian business. The prevalence of raiding shows to our foreign partners the unreliability of doing business in Ukraine, which holds back the flow of investment in the agrarian sector. The priority task of public authorities should be the demonstration of one hundred percent preservation of the rights of national and foreign enterprises owners.

For its part, UCAB also pays great attention to the prevention of raiding and is a member of the working group on the prevention of land raiding, which includes other profile agricultural associations, representatives of the Ministry of Justice and the State Land Cadastre. The aim of the group is to develop legislative proposals on the prevention of raider attacks and the establishment of appropriate mechanisms for the protection of agricultural producers’ rights,” - commented Roman Hrab, Expert in Land Law of the Association “Ukrainian Agribusiness Club”.