Legislative news digest: LEGAL HOTLINE 30.07.2020

The Law on Land Use Planning Has Been Officially Promulgated

On July 24, the Law “On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of Ukraine concerning Land Use Planning” was officially published in the newspaper “Holos Ukrainy” (The Voice of Ukraine).

The principal part of the Law will enter into force in a year.

This Law amends the Land Code of Ukraine, the Water Code of Ukraine and the laws of Ukraine, which introduce the possibility of drawing up community spatial planning schemes and establishing their purpose, community territory zoning and determining the directions of its sustainable development.

The adoption of the Law is expected to ensure the sustainable development of the territories, taking into account both public and private interests, in order to improve urban planning, land administration and facilitate the implementation of topographical, geodesic and cartography works for spatial planning.

Procedural Deadlines Are Prolonged Due To the Quarantine Under the New Rules: Law Adopted

According to the Law No. 731-IX “On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of Ukraine Concerning the Procedural Deadlines during the Quarantine Established by the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine to Prevent the Spread of Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19)”, which entered into force on 17^th of July, all court judgements adopted from March 12^th, 2020 through 07^th of August, 2020, enter into legal force.

In addition, this Law establishes that the procedural deadlines, which were previously automatically prolonged due to the quarantine, shall expire 20 days after the effective date of the Law, that is, on August the 06^th 2020. 

Therefore, until this date, the participants of the court proceedings have the right to renew the procedural deadlines only if the court recognizes the reasons for their prolongation as valid and such as due to quarantine restrictions. 

Thus, under the new Law, the deadlines are renewed or prolonged by the court only at the request of the parties and if there are valid reasons that are resulted by the imposed quarantine. Accordingly, court judgements taken during the period of quarantine come into force.

Green Tariff Rates Reduced: New legislative changes

On the 21^st of July 2020, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine passed the Law “On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of Ukraine Regarding Improvement of Terms of Support of Renewable Energy Producers”.

The Law provides for the following changes: 

• decrease of green tariffs rates starting from 01.07.2020 for facilities commissioned from 01.07.2015 to 31.12.2019 for solar power plants (SPPs) more than 1 MW by 15%; for SPPs less than 1 MW by 10%; and for wind power plants (WPPs) by 7.5%;
• decrease of green tariffs rates starting from 01.07.2020 for SPPs and for WPPs commissioned from 01.01.2020 by 2.5%;
• setting the maximum green tariff rate for renewable energy facilities commissioned before 30.06.2015, which will allow to reduce the green tariff rate for such facilities up to 52%;
• other improvements to the terms of support for green energy producers.

This Law is predicted to enable the sustainable development of renewable energy in a cost-effective way, taking into account the interests of the state, electric power producers from alternative energy sources, energy consumers and other market participants.

The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Passed the Law on The Reformation of Patent Legislation

On July 21, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine passed the Law “On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of Ukraine concerning the Reform of Patent Legislation”.

The purpose of the Law is to ensure the fulfilment of Ukraine’s obligations in the area of European integration by harmonizing the requirements of the effective Ukrainian legislation on the protection of the rights to inventions and utility models to the European Union law.

The patent reform, according to the new Law, provides:

• expanding the list of objects and technologies that are not covered by legal protection;
• possibility to submit intellectual property applications in the electronic form;
• the right of any person to file a reasoned objection to the application within six months from the date of its publication;
• clarification of the procedure for granting additional protection of rights to inventions;
• expanding the list of rights and obligations of subjects of rights to inventions (utility models);
• the possibility of recognizing the rights to an invention and utility model as invalid in an administrative order (“post-grant opposition”).

This Law is expected to ensure that the European Union’s level of protection of intellectual property rights on inventions and utility models is achieved, and that the obligations taken by Ukraine under the Association Agreement are fulfilled, as well as the intellectual property law of the European Union is implemented into national legislation.