Results of the Land Governance Monitoring for 2014-2015

Results indicate that:

• The introduction of a 7-year minimum rental period for agricultural land and the increase in the land tax rate coincides with a significant drop in the number of registered lease contracts. This decrease takes place despite the fact that notaries have received the right to register lease rights;
• As of December 1, 2015, 16,661,051 plots were registered by the State Land Cadastre with total area of 41,812,127.76 hectares, representing 69% of Ukraine’s territory. However, only 22.6% of state-owned land was registered;
• Development of the agricultural and non-agricultural land market is constrained by the lack of bank finance. From 2013 to 2015, only 1,899 plots were sold in Ukraine with the total area of 6215.76 hectares (0.02% of the privately owned land area). During this period, 91 mortgages were issued for the total area of 52.9 hectares. This indicates that mortgages practically do not exist in Ukraine. In contrast, mortgages are the primary source of finance for other developed real estate markets. Assessment and overcoming barriers on mortgage market deserves a primary attention by the Government during the development and implementation of land reform;
• As of 01.07.2015, about 4,671.5 thousand rental contracts for private agricultural land (shares) were signed in Ukraine for the total area of 16,597.0 thousand hectares (~50% of privately owned land). The average rent payment was 786 UAH/ha per year. Also, 56,053 rental contracts for state-owned land were established with an average rental payment of 1351.6 UAH/ha per year with a significant difference in rental price across the regions;
• During 2013-2015, rental (use) rights were registered for 832,551 land plots with the total area of 3,513,015.64 hectares (about 16% of the leased land);
• In January-September of 2015, the total number of land tax payers was 7,337,191 persons, among which 98% were individuals (vs. legal entities). This number represents 46% of the total number of landowners, registered by the State Land Cadastre, and only 31% of private landowners, reported by the statistical form 2-zem;
• Statistics for land distribution among public, private and communal ownership, reported by the existing statistical forms, does not match the actual distribution;
• The results of Monitoring point to a significant difference in the characteristics of land resources and land governance at the local level. Therefore, land reform must take into account the diversity of local conditions and capacity for implementation of reforms at the local level.