The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine has abolished two state regulation instruments, which it deemed obsolete. They duplicated a number of procedures that companies already have to undergo as part of an environmental impact assessment (EIA). The government adopted the relevant decision at a meeting on February 25.
This is evidenced by a statement on the official website of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine.
Key updates
The government announced that it had amended the following resolutions:
Thanks to the updated documents, businesses will now be relieved from the need to obtain approval for:
- Environmental protection action plans, as well as plans for the protection of the population and territories from emergencies. Previously, these documents required approval from several bodies – the State Environmental Inspectorate, the State Emergency Service, and local state administrations;
- Norms of the maximum permissible levels of impact of physical and biological factors from stationary sources of pollution on atmospheric air. Prior to the amendment, companies had to approve these parameters with the State Sanitary and Epidemiological Service.
According to the Cabinet, this decision was made in response to requests from businesses. Reducing administrative pressure is part of the deregulation reform, through which the Ukrainian authorities aim to simplify the business environment.
“Only in the manufacturing sector, more than 50,000 business entities will feel the impact of reduced administrative burden as a result of this decision,” the government emphasizes.
The environmental impact assessment procedure often draws criticism from businesses. EcoPolitic has previously reported that EIA registries are not suited for analytics, while the costs of public hearings do not reflect actual circumstances in which they are held. At the same time, businesses pay for the work of experts whose official registry simply does not exist.
