Ukraine’s destiny is the Belgian Congo – the bitter confession of a Kyiv economist
It's time to admit that Ukraine has turned into a fourth world country with a poor population.
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Vladimir Panchenko, program director of the Kyiv International Economic Forum (KIEF), director of the Alexander Pol Institute, wrote about this on the website of the Kiev magazine “New Time”.
“Somehow, imperceptibly, after recognizing the deplorable state of the economy in 2014, bright Hollywood-type images entered our daily lives,” the author notes. – The new smiling police, foreign ministers and advisers and transparent offices of government agencies have become a convenient screen behind which obvious things are hidden. Everyone is afraid to admit that Ukraine has turned into a fourth world country with a poor population. They tell us about record harvests, forgetting to mention the record drop in grain prices on world exchanges. They promise us to simultaneously reduce taxes and increase wages, which in itself are mutually exclusive phenomena. In any case, it doesn’t work in Ukraine.”
According to the KIEF program director, in fact, Ukraine has turned into the Portugal of thirty years ago - a country with a cheap labor force that still retains a certain level of qualifications. But, he points out, unlike Ukraine, the Portuguese had an EU assistance program, recognized their difficult situation and began to rebuild from scratch.
“Why don’t we accept the status quo? - suggests Panchenko. “I am in no way advocating to sprinkle ashes on your head. We just need to acknowledge where we are and start moving up from that low point. We must admit that our destiny for the next five years is a GDP of no more than $2 per year per person and, if necessary, work very hard so as not to turn into the Belgian Congo. If we insist (which, in fact, is happening) that we are a high-tech country, the breadwinner or drinker of Europe, we will not be able to get out of the trap for a long time.”
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