On January 25, UAFM took part in foresight for the recovery and development of Ukrainian exports – a session on the development of scenarios in which different ways of development in the future will be described, and the study of various conditions that can restrain the development of exports from Ukraine.

About 70 experts worked together, including representatives of member business associations at the national and regional levels, leading exporters, representatives of national and regional authorities, industry experts, think tanks, business schools, business media, public organizations, etc.

The proactivity of the authorities in the process of creating better conditions for the development of exports was confirmed by the participation in the session of the Deputy Minister of Economic Development, Trade and Agriculture of Ukraine, Trade Representative of Ukraine, Taras Kachka.

The facilitator of the session Valery Pekar – lecturer of the Kyiv-Mohyla Business School and the Lviv Business School of the Ukrainian Catholic University involved the participants in developing a well-argued and clear vision of the possible development of Ukrainian exports by 2030. Divided into working groups, the participants together predicted future challenges and discussed the desired results; consolidated efforts in the direction of reaching a consensus on problematic issues and ways to solve them; tried to reach an understanding regarding the driving forces (political, economic, social, technological, legislative and environmental) influencing the future development of exports in Ukraine.

In the process of work, the most important trends were identified in such areas as economy, politics, infrastructure, technology, ecology, humanity, and law.
Based on the main ones, they developed 8 possible scenarios for the development of Ukrainian exports, working in stages: free economy – protectionism, open country – closed, democracy – autocracy.

According to the subjects of influence, a list of actions was developed for working according to the most desired scenarios, which are: the state, large businesses, small and medium-sized businesses, business associations, civil society, donors, and financial institutions.

The President of UAFM, Volodymyr Patis, and the member of the Board of UAFM, Oksana Donska, by participating in the foresight, added important export developments of the furniture industry to the joint work and, together with other experts, are ready to continue modeling the best scenarios for the export future of our country.

The event is held within the framework of the Projects “Application and implementation of the Association Agreement between the EU and Ukraine in the field of trade” and “Supporting inclusive economic development in Ukraine by coordinating the export strategy with regional development and Central Development Cooperation”, financed by the German government and implemented by the German federal company Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH (GIZ) in cooperation with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP Ukraine / UNDP in Ukraine).