The pandemic caused by the COVID-19 has changed the trends of the world and domestic economy, the state of public finances, socio-cultural life of the population. The conditions for implementing the reform of administrative and financial decentralization initiated in the country have become more complicated. In such conditions, the growing epidemiological resilience of territorial communities is the most important competitive advantage of their development. The aim of the article is to study the development trends of Ukraine’s economy at the regional and local levels under the influence of the COVID crisis, to identify ways to overcome its negative consequences for the economy of regions and territorial communities. Methods. The following methods were used for the study: abstract-logical, comparative analysis, graphical visualization, statistical. The article analyzes the negative trends in the economy of the regions under the influence of quarantine measures introduced in connection with the COVID-19 epidemic: declining economic activity of industrial and agricultural enterprises, investment, regions’ export-import, and state and local budget revenues. The negative social effects of quarantine measures have been identified: a decrease in the average wage and the level of employment, an increase in the number of forced leave without pay. The article describes the features of state regulation of business activities in an epidemic and their impact on the content of state and local budgets. The paper emphasizes that the accelerated endogenous economic growth of territorial communities and the involvement in the economic turnover of resources not yet involved and their transformation into development assets is the way out of the situation. Ways of reorientation of business and state support of territorial communities are offered.
epidemic, entrepreneurship, budget revenues, region, territorial community
Cooperation between the territorial communities in Ukraine is nowadays one of the important directions of the local governance reform. The Constitution of Ukraine provides an opportunity to combine the municipal facilities and the funds of budgets for the implementation of joint projects or joint funding (maintenance) of municipal companies, organizations, and institutions, and create the respective managing bodies and services. The opportunity is implemented based on the adoption of the relevant legislation. In 1997, Ukraine ratified the European Charter of Local Self-Governance, which grants a right to local authorities to cooperate with other local authorities while performing its competences to accomplish the tasks that are of the common interest. The paper aims to research the efficiency of the use of the mechanisms of the territorial communities’ cooperation in conditions of the authorities’ decentralization. The paper analyzes the regulations directed at the support of cooperation between the territorial communities in conditions of the authorities’ decentralization. The features of cooperation between the territorial communities are outlined. The statistical information is monitored, and on this basis, the information on the condition of cooperation between the territorial communities in Ukraine in 2015-2019 is grouped and characterized. The conclusions on such cooperation are made. The mechanisms of cooperation between the territorial communities are examined. The advantages and positive effects that the communities can obtain in case of efficient cooperation are determined. The nature of joint projects is defined. The conceptual scheme of a territorial communities’ cooperation project is constructed. The ways to overcome the problems and measures to activate the cooperation between the territorial communities are suggested. The projects of communities’ cooperation as a tool to consolidate resources and accomplish the clearly defined objective are proven to be the ground for optimization of the administrative and territorial structure of the country, overcoming the depressive condition of certain areas, and creation of growth poles.
authorities’ decentralization, territorial communities, local self-governance, cooperation, projects
The latest trends in the analysis of socio-economic development, as opposed to taking into account the globalization processes impact, put more emphasis on the trends of regionalization at the interstate level. The understanding of the fact that not only states and enterprises but also individual regions are competing makes it possible to realize clearly the ultimate goal of the overall transformation of large economic systems which are designed to form, on the one hand, the most organic conditions for the development of individual regions and territories, and on the other, to take into account the prospects of regions’ involvement in the state regional policy implementation based on the results of their competitiveness monitoring. The article aims to formulate the essence of competitiveness monitoring by measuring and systematizing the author’s approaches to the interpretation of this term and assessment of information level and regulatory support for regions’ competitiveness monitoring in practice. The article systematizes information and regulatory support for monitoring competitiveness in Ukraine. The approaches to monitoring the competitiveness of regions and its functions are grouped; the features of problem-oriented monitoring of competitiveness are considered; a system for monitoring the implementation of state regional policy and its components is outlined; the principles of monitoring the competitiveness of the region are determined. The conclusion is made about the dynamism and changeability of the regional competitiveness phenomenon under the influence of factors of the changing development environment. It, in turn, makes it necessary to clarify the list of indicators that are determined in the process of the regions’ competitiveness monitoring, the systematic nature of the monitoring itself, and further consideration of its results in the state regional policy implementation.
Comprehensive assessment of the tourism and recreation capacity is an important prerequisite for optimizing the spatial and economic organization of regional tourism and recreation systems as well as for strategic planning of tourism and recreation on the national and regional scales. The purpose of the article is to assess the development capacity of the tourism and recreation industry and the efficiency of its use in the economy of Ukrainian regions. The analysis of factors influencing the formation of the capacity of the tourism and recreation industry in Ukrainian regions made it possible to group them into the following groups: natural-geographical, economic, socio-demographic, institutional, scientific, and technical. The paper outlines the main global trends in the development of the world market of tourist services, which determine the vector and opportunities for building the capacity of tourism and recreation in the regions of Ukraine given the criterion of strategic competitiveness and the goal of expanding development and integration of tourism industry on the international tourism market. The analysis of the dependencies of the main indicators of the tourism and recreation industry development in the regions of Ukraine for the period 2013-2018 pointed to the problem of inefficient use of transport infrastructure in increasing the potential of the tourism and recreation industry in the regions of Ukraine. Yet, the efficiency of the use of the tourism and recreation capacity was boosted by the volumes of capital investment in the tourism and recreation industry, as well as the volumes of foreign direct investment, which determines the feasibility of further state and local policies to support and stimulate both domestic and foreign investors in the development of tourism and recreation industry in Ukraine. The results of this study can be used in the formation of national, regional, and local strategies and programs for tourism and recreation, as they allow directing support and incentives to those factors that are more decisive in building the capacity of tourism and recreation in Ukraine.
region, economy, tourist-recreational sphere, development potential, evaluation
Clusters are considered to be the key to secure the competitiveness of the regional economy and implementation of goals under the innovative smart specialization directions in the entire developed world, including most EU countries. The EU is conducting a comprehensive goal-oriented cluster policy, which is part of its industrial policy. It supports and develops numerous initiatives, provides funding by the programs concerning clustering, and promotes the visibility and internationalization of clusters. Meanwhile, in Ukraine, the cluster policy is lacking. Although the importance of clusters development is noted in several programs and strategic documents, there isn’t any actual organizational or financial support of their activity. The paper aims to define the perspectives of cross-border clusters development along the Western border of Ukraine, taking into account their proximity to the EU, areas of specialization of adjoining regions, and peculiarities of functioning of clusters in Ukraine. The paper examines the peculiarities of the cluster policies in the EU and in Ukraine. The major initiatives and programs of cluster development in the EU are determined. The current condition of clusters development in the border oblasts of the Western Ukraine is analyzed. The examples of successful cross-border clusters in the EU are offered. The list of declared cross-border clusters with Ukrainian participation in the border oblasts of the Western Ukraine is presented. The clusters in the adjoining regions of neighbouring countries along the Western border of Ukraine in the domains related to major directions of clusters activity in the respective Ukrainian oblasts within the cross-border region are detected. The smart specialization areas of the adjoining regions of neighbouring countries along the Western border of Ukraine in the domains within the major directions of clusters activity in the respective Ukrainian oblasts in the framework of the cross-border region are analyzed. The main bottlenecks of cross-border clusters development are outlined and the primary directions of their solution are suggested.
EU cluster policy, cross-border clusters, cluster initiatives, smart specialization areas, oblasts along the Western border of Ukraine
The shadow economy nowadays is one of the most substantial threats for the development of the financial sector in Ukraine and is the ground for sham entrepreneurship, corruption, organized crime, etc. The shadow activity phenomenon is, to a certain extent, peculiar to all types of economic activity in Ukraine. The article examines the preconditions for the shadowing of the financial services sector. The level of its shadowing in the context of the regions of Ukraine is calculated. The causal links, features and threats of covert, informal and illegal activities in the financial services sector are studied, in particular: tax evasion (as deliberate concealment / understatement of profits from doing business), unproductive outflow (export) of financial resources, sham entrepreneurship, legalization (laundering) of proceeds from crime and more. The paper establishes that the determinants of creating conditions for efficient legal activity in the financial services sector should be: creating favorable tax conditions for doing business in the studied sector; reducing the gap between the level of interest rates on deposits and loans, reducing the level of interest rates in the economy as a whole, which will make the lending procedure more accessible to individuals and businesses; increasing monetary discipline; strengthening control over financial markets in terms of counteracting unproductive capital outflows through scheme institutions; countering cybercrime; expanding financial inclusion; stimulating and developing innovation in the financial services sector. The paper proves that the real fall in shadow activity in the financial services sector can take place in case of declining costs and growing efficiency of the legal economy and creation of parity conditions for the functioning of various forms of business in the financial domain. The falling fiscal pressure on the legal economy should be the key condition for such a transformation, which would create motivation for transferring the shadow operations to the legal grounds.
shadowing of the economy, shadowing of the financial sector, de-shadowing of the economy, financial services sector, financial services market, financial market
The investment capacity of the households of any country is the decisive factor of increasing the wellbeing of each person, population, and socio-economic system of a state in general. Growing nominal and real income of population and creation of respective financial resources that secure their transformation into the investment resource are the major preconditions of improvement of the households’ investment opportunities. Households become increasingly active savers and perspective investors for the domestic economy as they invest temporary free funds in various financial tools. The article examines the study of households, their financial behavior and interests, as increasing the welfare of each individual strengthens the entire socio-economic system of the state. The question of the peculiarities of the formation of financial resources in the conditions of market relations in Ukraine is outlined. Factors influencing their state of formation are determined. The role of household savings in the development of the economy is substantiated, the classification of savings depending on the nature of mobilization is considered. The dynamics of savings attracted by the banking system of Ukraine is analyzed. The situation with deposits of domestic households is outlined, and the dependence of investment decisions of households on the general political and economic situation in the country is demonstrated. Emphasis is placed on non-bank credit institutions, in particular on credit unions and private pension funds, life insurance contracts. The popularity of unorganized savings of households in Ukraine is proved, which is due to the lack of public confidence in financial institutions. The author proposes directions to motivate the savings of households in Ukraine in order to increase the productivity of their operation.
Ensuring food security and developing agricultural production is impossible without investment. At the same time, some scientists note that a significant amount of foreign investment increases the dependence of the domestic economy and enterprises on foreign investors. In addition, subsidies lead to a lack of motivation among entrepreneurs to attract additional investment resources and increase the dependence of production on areas of state support. Some investment models contribute to the deterioration of the environment, and technological advances are not available to small farmers who do not have the financial resources to apply the technology. Therefore, investment is important to ensure the effective development of the agricultural sector and food security mechanism. However, the presence of a significant amount of foreign investment can lead to the dependence of the national economy on investors, which can have a negative impact on the cost of agricultural products, production volumes, exchange rates and purchasing power of the population. The aim of the article is to analyze the impact of investment on the agricultural production as the main component of food security mechanism. To analyze the effectiveness of investment we chose the indicators “Government spending on agriculture”, “Foreign direct investment in agriculture” and the indicator “Agricultural production”. As a result of the analysis, it was found that the impact of government investments on agricultural production is not significant. This trend can be explained by the existing theory that there is no significant positive impact of government investments on the efficiency of agricultural enterprises due to the lack of incentives for farmers to innovate and compete in the market environment. A strong direct link between the indicators “Foreign direct investment in agriculture” and “Agricultural production”, which indicates a significant impact of foreign direct investment on agricultural production, is emphasized.
investment resources, subsidies, agriculturalsector, foodsecurity, food security system
Technological development of society is of unequal cyclic nature and is characterized by changing periods of economic growth, stagnation phases, and technological crises. The new wave of technological changes and new technological basis corresponding to the technological paradigm boost the role of innovations and displace the traditional factors of economic growth. Currently, intellectual and scientific-technical capacity are the main economic development resources. The use of innovation and new knowledge change the technological structure of the economy, increase the elements of the innovative economy, knowledge economy, and digital economy, i.e. the new technological paradigm is formed. The paper aims to research the basic determinants of technological paradigms’ forming and development, and determining their key features, as well as to analyze social transformations of the EU Member States and Ukraine. The paper focuses attention on the research of the features of social transformations. The structural transformations are analyzed based on the Bertelsmann Transformation Index that estimates the quality of democracy, market economy, and political governance. The transformation processes are assessed on the example of the EU Member States and Ukraine. The authors argue that social transformations and structural changes in the economy are related to the change of technological paradigms that boost the economic modernization and gradual progressive development of humanity in general. The nature and main determinants of 5 industrial and 2 post-industrial technological paradigms are outlined. Their general features and main areas of basic technologies implementation emerging in the realization of a certain technological paradigm are explained. The conclusions regarding the fact that innovative technologies and available scientific-technological resources define the main vector of economic development are made. The new emerging technological paradigm is of strategic importance for society development.
The article deals with the modern aspects of “shadowing” economy as socio-economic fact. The definition of “shadowing economy” is revealed not to be regulated by the legislative acts of Ukraine. Retrospective analysis of the legal regulation of the term “service” proves a diversity of modern interpretation of this category in the legal documents of Ukraine. Currently, the essence of the term “commerce service” is not regulated by any document. The results of the official integrated estimation of the size of the shadow economy do not show its real state and development tendencies by the types of economic activity differentiated according to the specific areas and types of services. The absence of a clear definition of the object of procurement, primarily the service sector, which leads to manipulation and inefficient use of funds is established to be one of the main factors determining the corruption risks in the system of public and sub-procurement. Nowadays, the State Classifier of Products and Services DK 016:2010 (SCPS) defined as the potential basis for industrial classification of products/services is a systematized summary of product names and services with their coding according to the hierarchical system of classification. The peculiarities and problems of implementing SCPS and the other classifications in the service sector are analyzed. The article proves that the State Statistics Service of Ukraine ignores methodologically SCPS as the ground for statistical classifications named “base for classifier conflicts” under stagnation of the national classification system, which preserves the risks of increased ‘shadowing’ in accounting and procurement and blocks the potentially transparent commercialization of services and their cumulative impact on socio-economic growth by different types of economic activity. The paper suggests the range of elements to be defined as integral elements of the legislative mechanism for the economy unshadowing in the service sector.
services, law-economic regulations, classification and identification of services, unshadowing the economy
Nowadays, the domestic consumer goods market plays an important role in maintaining the living standards of the population. Its development is an important precondition of accelerated economic growth in the country. Yet, the current condition of the domestic market is characterized by the availability of many negative trends that are stipulated by the bottlenecks in the public regulation of the consumer market and lack of controllability of its certain development processes. An objective need to search for the ways and tools to efficiently manage the development of the domestic consumer market on the system basis requires the thorough scientific-methodological substantiation of a range of important issues like defining the goals and priorities of the consumer market development and elaborating the tactics of its development in times of European integration as a set of measures directed at the implementation of strategic goals. The paper aims to determine the strategic priorities in public regulation of the domestic consumer goods market. The paper examines the theoretical foundations of the consumer market’s public regulation. The functioning of enterprises on the domestic market is analyzed, and on this basis, their operating efficiency is determined. The regulative framework related to the issues of the economic development and trade processes in particular in the times of COVID-19 is analyzed. The priorities and tasks of regulation of the competitive process at the domestic market in the short-term and middle-term perspectives in conditions of the pandemic are suggested based on examining the foreign sector of Ukraine in 2013-2019 and the consensus-prognosis for 2020-2021. The place of the domestic consumer goods market’s development strategy in maintaining the sustainable development in Ukraine is determined, and the main tasks of implementation of the domestic consumer goods market’s development policy are outlined. In the course of examining the main trends of the domestic market functioning in current economic conditions, the problems hampering their development were identified. The strategy of the domestic consumer goods market development is characterized.
domestic market, consumer goods, public regulation, strategic priorities, competitiveness
Modern socio-economic transformations and the development of ideas of universalization of individual rights and needs emphasize the urgency of overcoming the new forms of inequality and finding effective mechanisms for consolidation and integration of social systems to avoid negative social phenomena that threaten national security, preventing the exclusion of certain groups from public life, forming the stable social ties and interpersonal cooperation, which is an important condition for the successful development of the state and society as a whole. The changes taking place in Ukraine today are marked by the ambivalence of their impact: on the one hand, there are positive changes towards the necessary reforms, on the other – the aggravation of social tensions due to instability, bottlenecks or imperfections of the reform process itself, increasing income gaps and limiting the access of large sections of the population to resources, including basic social services, etc. Despite the significant number of scientific papers on the phenomenon of social exclusion, the issue of substantiation of the forms and features of social exclusion, as well as the dynamics of its spread in Ukrainian society remains insufficiently elaborated. Thus, the purpose of this article is to study the phenomenon of social exclusion in Ukrainian society. In the context of the study, the reasons underlying the formation of the phenomenon of social exclusion in Ukraine in the early stages of statehood are substantiated, the problems that determine its spread in modern Ukrainian society, and the consequences of the impact on society are highlighted. A categorical analysis of the phenomenon of social exclusion is carried out, in particular by forms of manifestation, criteria and factors, scale of distribution, levels of formation, and nature of social ties. Based on the analysis, the peculiarities of the manifestation of social exclusion in Ukraine at different stages of development of Ukrainian society are revealed.
social exclusion, inequality, socio-economic transformations, social structure of society, deprivation, discrimination, social ties
The aim of the article is to study the existing and find new approaches to the analysis of creative, information and knowledge-based factors that determine social transformations and economic growth of the EU regions based on smart specialization. The methodological approaches to the assessment of the implementation of creative, information and knowledge-based factors in the economy are studied. A comparative analysis of international and regional systems for evaluating creative, information and knowledge-based factors of economic growth is made. A system of indicators of the authors’ three-vector approach (by the directions: (1) intellectualization of economy, (2) digitalization of economy and society, (3) technological modernization) to the analysis of creative, information and knowledge-based factors in the realization of the smart specialization model at a regional level are developed. The developed authors’ technique allows providing a comprehensive approach to the analysis of creative, information and knowledge-based factors in terms of the smart specialization model at the regional level. The methodology involves three groups of indicators in the areas of intellectualization, digitalization, and technological modernization. The calculation of the integral index is carried out based on the method of multidimensional weighted value taking into account the degree of the weight of indicators and sub-indices (subgroups and groups of indicators). The scientific novelty of the study is that the integral index allows making important analytical conclusions about the level of development of creative, information and knowledge-based economy, as well as the correlation of these processes with the socio-economic development of regions. The methodological approach can be implemented in domestic practice for evaluating the impact of the use of creative, information and knowledge-based factors on the development of regional economies and, accordingly, for achieving the objectives of regional smart specialization strategies.
regional policy, socio-economic development of regions, smart specialization, creative, information and knowledge-based factors
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UDC 332.1:332.0553; JEL R11, H72, О18