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The government's plan to receive over $1 billion from farmland sales in 2020 is realistic, he believes.
After the introduction of the farmland market, the state will start selling land, but the money will go to local communities instead of a central budget, said Minister of Economy, Trade and Agriculture Tymofiy Mylovanov
In an interview with Hromadske, Mylovanov said he believed that the government's plan to receive over $1 billion from farmland sales in 2020 is realistic.
"But this money will go to communities and to people. This money won't go to the government or the national budget," the minister stressed.
He said that communities would be able to decide for themselves what to do with this land – "to sell it or to build a playground."
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To make this process transparent, land will be sold at open auctions – either at Prozorro e-procurement latform or at a special site.
Mylovanov specified how the state expects to receive more than $1 billion from the sale of land. He reminded that in Ukraine there are about 42 million hectares of arable land, and if the state sells 5% of this amount, it will be about $2 billion.
"But it's not exclusively state-owned land that will be sold, it will also be private. We expect 5% of the land to be sold next year. If it were state land at a low price of $1,000, then it would be $2 billion. If half of this land is public and half is private, it's a billion," Mylovanov explained.
The minister added that the government expects the land will cost more than $1,000 per hectare, and then its sale will bring even more money.
As UNIAN reported earlier, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky instructed the Verkhovna Rada before December 1, 2019 to approve a bill on the farmland market.
On September 19, Prime Minister of Ukraine Oleksiy Honcharuk stated that the land market in Ukraine would be launched on October 1, 2020.
The government has said they plan to check the origin of the money to be used to acquire land plots. The government also said it would allow foreign companies to sell and buy land shares. At the same time, these companies need to create a legal entity in Ukraine.