In the near future, Ukraine and Canada intend to begin discussions on the expansion of the Free Trade Agreement between the countries.

This was stated by the Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador of Ukraine in Canada Andriy Shevchenko on the air of Radio NV.

"I think that it's time to expand the Free Trade Agreement into the sphere of services and investments. This is the next logical step and I think that we are even late with the start of these negotiations. In the coming months, I think that no later than October we will begin negotiations on expanding the scope of the Agreement. There is a preliminary agreement that Stepan Kubiv [First Deputy Prime Minister - Minister of Economic Development and Trade - NV] will fly to Canada in order to hold a meeting of the bilateral commission that administers our Free Trade Agreement. I think that this is a good moment to start negotiations, "he said..

In his words, in services Canada is very interested in everything related to IT-technologies.

"This is a very strong direction for our cooperation. Now large Canadian companies give serious orders to Ukrainian IT specialists. We are talking about thousands of Ukrainian IT people who are involved in writing software for Canadian companies. The agreement should create better conditions for this, "the ambassador explained..

Recall that the Free Trade Agreement between Ukraine and Canada entered into force on August 1, 2017.

98% of tariffs on Ukrainian goods of the predominantly agricultural sector of the economy were abolished, with the exception of poultry, dairy products, cheeses, eggs, which will be subject to quotas. For Canadian goods 72% of tariffs were abolished, and within 7 years duty-free exports will increase to 98%.

In addition, the agreement opened the public procurement markets, and certain sections of the document were aimed at protecting e-commerce and intellectual property.