Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has said that 2016 will be declared the year of the English language in Ukraine.
In his annual address to parliament, the president said that learning English is a priority in the development strategy.
“At the moment, Ukraine ranks globally among the countries with the lowest level of proficiency in English. This is a barrier for Ukrainians switching to western values. This limits our access to scientific research, 80 percent of which are published in English. 55 percent of web pages are also written in English,” Poroshenko said.
“We will declare 2016 the year of the English language,” he said.
The president also stressed that the knowledge of English will be a key criterion for admission to the civil service. “This should be introduced gradually in the coming years,” Poroshenko said.
However, the president stressed the priority of the Ukrainian language.
