Representatives of 21 countries and over 550 companies took part in the 7th Lviv international investment forum Euro-2012: Forward, Ukraine! For a few days Lviv turned into a veritable business and economic capital of Ukraine. A series of plenary meetings, workshops, and roundtables, including the key event, the international conference “Attracting Investments as a Prerequisite for Euro-2012,” entirely distracted the city and its guests from politics. That’s no surprise because, according to Poland’s Minister of Construction Miroslaw Barszcz, who also participated in the forum, it would be correct to consider Euro- 2012 as a global civilization project that will give a powerful spur to the development to the two partner countries and help the two nations lay a solid groundwork for further cooperation.
If we consider that Ukraine is facing the daunting task of attracting $3 billion in the next five years to build a sports, transportation, and related social infrastructure, it becomes clear why the forum members had a serious discussion of the question of creating a favorable investment climate. Addressing the investors, Ivan Fedorenko, chairman of the Euro-2012 Organizing Committee, said, “Nobody else will ever offer you such lucrative conditions. On our part, we are looking forward to bona fide investors, who will come to Ukraine through the main entrance. We are striving for transparent relations and we reject corruption, racketeering, and information wars.”
Lviv is expecting investors to build key facilities and has already announced the top-priority projects; a 35,000-seat stadium, new hotels, reconstructing the city airport, connecting Lviv to the high-speed railway network, and rebuilding the bus station. The forum even held a land sales auction.
Preparatory work for hosting the European Soccer Championship matches in Ukraine, including Lviv, was also at the top of the agenda of an international investment and real estate fair that was held concurrently with the forum. The Palace of Arts exhibited various projects, including concrete offers from some city districts, which may be of interest to potential investors. A number of projects are directly linked with Euro- 2012: for example, expositions of the special economic zone Yavoriv, Horodok, Sambir and Brody raions showed projects to establish new border crossings and improve the roadside infrastructure. At the same time, raions in Lviv oblast have proposed projects to develop existing facilities and build new ones in the socio-cultural sector.
Credobank, the fair’s permanent partner, offered special financial instruments in connection with the championship, such as the Credit Ukraine program and a Credobank investment project worth one billion hryvnias. It also organized the roundtable “Ukraine-Poland: Financial and Investment Cooperation on the Way to Euro-2012,” attended by members of the Polish-Ukrainian Economic Chamber.
Another permanent partner of the International Investment Fair, the Lviv Center of Scientific and Technological Information, is holding an international seminar entitled “Modern Approaches to and Techniques for Solving the Problem of Energy Conservation and Ukraine’s Energy Independence,” which has also sparked a lot of interest. In other words, potential investors do not feel bored in Lviv today: they have been given so many ideas to think about and so many realistic projects that all they have to do is roll up their sleeves (i.e., count the money) and get to work.
