Ukrainian Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman said the nation is committed to meeting requirements needed to restart borrowing from the International Monetary Fund.
On Sept. 13 he met with David Lipton, the IMF first deputy managing director, who arrived in Kyiv for a short visit.
“Our joint program with the IMF is extremely important. Ukraine needs the reforms that we are doing not the IMF,” Groysman said at the media briefing following the meeting,
He added that the government was going to present the draft of the 2018 State budget on Sept. 15.
Lipton pointed that over the last year the Ukrainian government managed to stabilize the situation in the country, which laid good foundation for further dynamic economic growth.
“The global economy is growing now. And Ukraine should use this opportunity now,” he said.
On the same day Lipton also met with the President Petro Poroshenko and the board of the National Bank of Ukraine.
The NBU said that despite the fact that the situation in the financial market remains stable and external economic factors are favourable, the overall microeconomic situation in Ukraine still remains vulnerable to shocks, the bank’s press service reported on Sept. 13.
According to the Interfax-Ukraine, the next IMF mission to Ukraine to review the lending program is expected to arrive on Sept. 19.
The four-year program was launched by the IMF in March 2015 to support Ukrainian economy in the wake of Russia’s war in the Donbass and annexation of Crimea. Ukraine has already received $8.32 billion out of the total sum $17.25 billion. The last tranche of $1 billion came in April
Earlier, Finance Minister Oleksandr Danylyuk said in an interview to Bloomberg that the next tranche of more than $1 billion is likely to be received this fall.
But this seems rather improbable as Ukraine has lagged on meeting some of the most crucial requirements demaned by the IMF, such as launch of agricultural land market, creation of anti-corruption court, pension reform, and privatization of state enterprises.
