Bakhmatyuk Accuses Sytnyk of Destroying 37 Enterprises and 13 Thousand Jobs
Having to survive for the past eighteen months under unprecedented pressure by NABU, one of Ukraine's largest agricultural groups has now been forced to fully shut down operations at 37 enterprises and lay off 13 thousand employees
Instead of fighting top-level government corruption, NABU Director Artem Sytnyk is forcing his employees to fight a major Ukrainian producer. A consequence of this war is a complete shutdown of 37companies of the group Ukrlandfarming, which has put 13,000 Ukrainians out of a job and resulted in 1.5 billion hryvnias less taxes paid in the last year alone. Modern farms are being closed down including unique breeding facilities. The fallout from this can be catastrophic for the whole sector. Egg farms are being shut down as we speak with output dramatically cut down causing egg prices in Ukraine to skyrocket, the group's statement reads.
Ukrlandfarming claims that this situation directly threatens 30,000 jobs, jeopardises support for 706 Ukrainian rural communities, regular land payments to 298,000 individual landowners who leased their land plots to Ukrlandfarming to feed their families. The group operates four thousand production facilities all over Ukraine including large and modern grain elevators and factories, it has paid UAH 7.8 billion in national taxes and local rates over the past three years (an average of 2-3 billion hryvnias per year) and contributed 1.1% to Ukraine's GDP.
The group has shared a list of 37 enterprises that have been shut down completely following eighteen months of pressure by NABU and indicated that that it would now cost up to 500 thousand dollars to create one job at a new factory farm including the required capital investment.
Who would make such an investment in Ukraine under the current circumstances to rebuild the country's lost production and export potential, who would bring back the thousands of jobs lost? That of course is a rhetorical question.
Just as a reminder, the owner of Ukrlandfarming, Oleg Bakhmatyuk, has earlier accused Artem Sytnyk of unlawful persecution acting from motives of personal vengeance. The NABU director was found guilty of a corrupt act and listed in the official register of corrupt officials of the National Corruption Prevention Agency. The prime witness for the prosecution was an advisor to Bakhmatyuk's sister.