Three years ago, it was difficult to find accurate and current information online in English about traveling to Ukraine. Ukraine’s adoption of a visa free regime in mid-2005 eased the way for westerners to come to Ukraine. That, in turn led to a substantial increase of

Growth of outsourcing in Ukraine’s Information Technology sector averaging at 40% annually for four years is a bright spot for Ukraine’s entire economy. In contrast to the apparent political stalemate over the country’s east-west economic trajectory, even Ukraine’s politicians were “quicker than usual” to support provisions to help keep this trend on track.

Doing Business in Ukraine offered by www.doingbusiness.org (an extension of the World Bank) provides a comparative index and ranking of virtually all aspects of “doing business” in Ukraine in relation to 178 other countries.

Small Business Administration (USA) - A potential resource for statistics, good business practices and step-by-step start-up and follow-on advice even if the benefits and programs of this organization are not available to everyone. For citizens of the United States, the SBA is a first stop business planning resource, especially for veterans.

Also associated with the SBA is the Service Corps of Retired Executives deserving a listing even if the only thing they did was establish Small Business Power-Links. SCORE’s second real advantage is offering free counseling (consultation) from 1,400 volunteer counselors across 600 skills, a free service available online that helps achieve cost avoidance on paid consultation service that can run from up to (and sometimes over) $500 an hour.

The World Bank web site is an excellent source for research for virtually any country. It has an extensive library and archive of free downloadable documents. Sorting through it to find information of specific relevance to your interest may take some time, but that is time well-spent. You are effectively assured of finding qualified, high end data in its online library and elsewhere. Three documents in particular stand out as especially informative for any business with interests in Ukraine:

• Ukraine Jobs Study: Fostering Productivity and Job Creation, Part I (52 page PDF document) and Part II (107 page PDF document) by Human Development Sector Unit; Ukraine, Belarus and Moldova Country Unit – December 20, 2005.


• Are Wages in Ukraine too Low? And What Could Be Done to Increase Them? by Martin Raiser, Economic Advisor, World Bank Country Office, Belarus, Moldova, Ukraine – April 2007, 16 page PDF Document

These are essentially in the same series. The first set is somewhat dated, but is comprehensive; while the second helps bring it up to date – thus appropriate to consider all three together with respect to jobs and wages, productivity, analysis of trends in both the public and private sector, impediments and catalysts to growth, and so forth. I would classify this as mandatory reading for any medium to enterprise level business considering activity in Ukraine.