The UK media outlet Express reports: “The construction of the GORO Mountain ski resort has started in the Lviv region, which will build 25 hotels, 5,500 rooms stretching across a total area of 2,965 acres, with 41 46.6-mile-long ski slopes with 846 acres of snow cove, over 10 miles of ski lifts, two modern gondola lifts and 11 chairlifts.”
According to the project owner OKKO and many other news articles, OKKO is the largest Ukrainian gas station network that basically survives because Ukrain gets US and European subsidies for the government’s and the population’s survival. OKKO which is privately owned by an oligarch, will invest own funds of $500 million and will obtain $1 billion further investments. It is not known who will be the further investors but there have been already claims and rumors in the press that it might be the German government or the EU – which was denied by OKKO.
Ukraine, without notable own oil resources, was importing over $7 billion of refined oil products in 2023. From: Greece ($1.02B), India ($1.02B), Lithuania ($822M), Poland ($751M), and Turkey ($591M). The fastest growing import between 2022 and 2023 were Greece ($502M), the US ($304M) and Turkey ($224M). The major refinery Kremenchuk was destroyed in 2022. Of course, Ukraine’s oil products imports are highly subsidize by foreign governments or simply paid for.
While it is reassuring that Ukrainian oligarchs have billions in Switzerland, it may allow to reflect how, in particular, a local gas station network can still earn lots of money and afford a luxury ski resort investment. Imports and consumption of oil products are subsidized, so the network can safely earn. Such subsidies are refinanced by generous foreign governments that pay also salaries and pensions in Ukraine, pay the Ukrainian state budget and the army, support small businesses and pay for a multitude of infrastructure and social projects. This money partly flows also into the tills of the gas station network.
OKKO declared that also its luxury ski resort will receive tax subsidies in form of reduced taxes.
It would be strange if tax payer money from Europe would find its way to a luxury resort in Western Ukraine, wouldn’t it? But assessing the news, OKKO’s statements and the reality in Ukraine, there cannot be another variant than the indirect financing of the ski resort by foreign governments. Wouldn’t it be more appropriate to invest the $1.5 billion in really needed infrastructure?
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