Chabany (Kyiv region) – Ukrainian First Deputy Prime Minister Valeriy Khoroshkovsky has said he believes that the current system of state support for agriculture should be changed.
"I think that the funds [to support agriculture] are being used ineffectively… We are trying to find an economically reasonable position under which we would be able to develop agriculture really seriously," he said at a briefing in Kyiv region on March 29.
He said that the government, the Agricultural Policy and Food Ministry and the National Academy of Agricultural Sciences were currently working on possible ways to improve the effectiveness of state support for rural areas.
At the same time, Khoroshkovsky drew attention to the presence of corruption in agriculture.
"Even in the funds that are allocated [for agriculture], unfortunately, we see a constant system of corruption, a constant system of kickbacks. And, therefore, the funds that were supposed to reach producers, they, unfortunately, do not reach them, or in best case they get only half of them," he said.
