Ukraine to lose $1 billion due to Russian restrictions

Russia's transit ban has cut Ukraine's GDP by 0.3% and it has also reduced Ukarine's export volume to Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan

Ukraine will lose at least $1 billion this year due to trade and transit restrictions imposed by Russia.

Russia's transit ban will directly reduce Ukraine's export volume to Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, and cut Ukraine's gross domestic product (GDP) by 0.3 per cent this year, Ukraine's Economic Development and Trade Deputy Minister Nataliya Mykolska said on Wednesday.

In the first five months of 2016, Ukraine's export volume to Russia fell by 36.2 per cent year-on-year and is expected to plunge further, Xinhua news agency reported.

Agriculture, metallurgy, freight and logistics industry, packaging industry, pharmaceutical industry and light industry will also suffer losses, she added.

Since the start of 2016, Moscow has taken a series of restrictive measures against Ukraine, including the suspension of a Russia-Ukraine free trade agreement in response to Kiev joining a free trade zone of the European Union.

Besides, Moscow has imposed a total ban on the import of agricultural products from Ukraine, and restricts the automobile and railway transit of goods from Ukraine via Russia.

In response, Kiev has cancelled preferential import duties on a range of Russian goods and imposed an embargo on some products made in Russia.