IMF’s First Deputy Managing Director: Right decision on land reform in Ukraine needed

David Lipton, First Deputy Managing Director of the IMF said this in an interview with the Ekonomichna Pravda online newspaper.

"Land reform remains an important element of the program. What was agreed is that more time is needed to get the right decision on this important topic," the IMF representative said.

According to him, "For the last quarter of the century I’m being told by various politicians that land reform in Ukraine is impossible. It is true that it takes time and benefits come over time. But it shouldn't take 25 years! We see the revival of agriculture, which is clearly among Ukraine’s strengths. Even agriculture that had been oriented on export to Russia has been very effectively reoriented toward the West," he stressed.

As Lipton noted, it is important that there are incentives to invest in agriculture, which means that land should be available for the use as collateral when raising investment capital. “Equally important is that farmers have the certainty of access to land over time, so that they are farming the land sustainably,” he stressed.

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