Business to operate on application basis

Before long one will be able to start in business not after receiving all kinds of authorizations but by filing an application. Under the new principle a person starting in business, rather than having it licensed, will submit an application to just one registration authority and start operating practically at the same time. After receiving it, the registrar will notify all the controlling authorities and they will enter the new business in their files.

The current licensing system is regulated by 64 laws on business and three hundred cabinet resolutions. So, after the president signs the edict, the State Regulatory Policy and Entrepreneurship Committee (SRPEC) will start on the next phase in the licensing reform, envisaging thorough upgrading of the legal framework.

Needless to say, the innovating approach caused no enthusiasm among the bureaucrats, as became clear even at the stage of discussing various drafts. According to Mr Tretyakov, deputy chairman of SRPEC, the committee met with “severe opposition” on the part of almost all ministries and agencies. This was to be expected, of course, considering the presence of almost 100 controlling authorities and that all such agencies are not interested in clear cut, transparent business conditions. At present, noted Mr Tretyakov, the cost of all those authorizations a businessman must receive, by visiting countless bureaucratic offices, reaches UAH 2-2.5 thousand.

Nevertheless, the process of adopting transparent business-licensing procedures is underway, beginning in the regions. Zenovy Bermes, coordinator of a coalition of businessmen's associations monitoring the process, says the first license-simplifying experiment in Ivano-Frankivsk and Mykolayiv fully confirmed the validity of the new approach. He believes that upgrading the licensing system will create a more favorable business climate in Ukraine and help solve the unemployment problem and receive new budget income sources.

By Petro Izhyk, The Day,October,22^nd,2002

1. Nowadays one can start business by filing an application.

2. According to the new licensing system a person starting in business must submit an application to one registration authority.

3. At present the licensing system is regulated by one registration authority.

4. The bureaucrats oppose the innovating approach.

5. Upgrading the licensing system will receive new budget income sources.

6. The first license-simplifying experiment fully confirmed the advantage of the new approach.

7. The new licensing system is bureaucratic.

8. State Regulatory Policy and Entrepreneurship Committee upgraded the legal framework.

9. The process of adopting transparent business-licensing procedures has been monitoring by Mr Tretyakov.

10. SRPEC are not interested in clear cut, transparent business conditions

3.2. Read the text and insert the missing words from the box:

National airlines are facing severe 1) …………… from a new generation of cheaper 2)…………….... By cutting their costs and offering cheap 3)………………, budget airlines have caught up, and in some cases overtaken, national carriers in reputation and popularity. Overstaffed and 4)……………….. national carriers find it hard to compete and regularly 5)………….. new managers to turn them around. These new managers come up with ideas to turn the airlines into more efficient and 6)………………… operations. Even so, they find it hard to stay ahead of the low-cost airlines. Just to break even is a tremendous struggle and they usually make enormous 7)…………….. Such rivalry is good for 8)………………, but price-cutting means that some well-known national carriers may not survive. They will become obsolete unless they switch to the practices of their low cost 9)…………………. This will mean improving their 10)………………. and diversifying into other services.

IV. Speaking. Match each phrase with its function: