Opportunities and Risks of Economic Development in Post-Covid Period for Ukraine and Eastern Europe

Abstract

After a major downturn of the global economy in 2020 caused by the Covid-19 pandemic and despite renewed lockdowns in some parts of the world there are optimistic projections about global economy to rebound in 2021. The authors consider the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic for the economies of Eastern Europe and Ukraine. Purpose of the article is to analyze the latest tendencies of economic growth perspectives in Eastern Europe countries due to COVID-19 pandemic and define the main risks, challenges and strong positions of Ukraine in post-pandemic period. The relevance of this topic lies, first of all, in the importance of determining the prospects for economic development of countries in different scenarios of the pandemic. Based on an in-depth analysis of data from international and Ukrainian agencies and individual experts, forecast data on the future economic development during 2021-2022 of Ukraine and some Eastern Europe countries are summarized. Ukraine, comparing to many countries around the world, has a relatively smaller reduction of economic indexes in 2020, due to the transformational nature of our economy, weak participation in global value chains, a significant share of shadow business and income, underdeveloped tourism, a significant share of agriculture and a large share of large-scale production, which did not stop even during peak quarantine periods.. Attention was paid to the specific risks of a pandemic for the economic development at global level, in Europe and Central Asia region and in Ukraine. The most significant challenges for national economic development were defined as such: strengthening hybrid threats to Ukraine's national security, lack of external financing and narrowing of access to international capital markets, failure to receive planned funding from the IMF, low intensity of reforms. Due to such serious risk factors, there is a need to develop a balanced regulatory to counter growing threats and restore economic growth to pre-pandemia level.