The state is selling the largest remaining distillery. He hasn't worked for 15 years

The State Property Fund put up the Lokhvitsky alcohol plant in the Poltava region for privatization.

The State Property Fund put up for an online privatization auction the unified property complex of the State Enterprise “Lokhvitsky Distillery Plant”. The auction will take place in the Prozorro system. Sales will take place on May 23, the starting price of the lot is UAH 11.22 million.

The State Property Fund made the first attempt to privatize the Lokhvitsky distillery in March. The auction was canceled due to lack of participants.

The main activity of the enterprise is distillation, rectification and mixing of alcoholic beverages. The enterprise's capacity allows it to produce 6,000 deciliters of rectified water per day, but it has not been operating since 2009.

As of March 31, 2024, the overdue accounts payable of SOEs amounted to UAH 55.68 million. The average number of employees is three people.

Reference

EMK State Enterprise “Lokhvitsky Distillery Plant” was put into operation in 1934, in 1937 it was transformed into a spirit plant. In Soviet times, the plant was one of the largest industrial enterprises in the city; social infrastructure facilities and houses were on its balance sheet. After the declaration of independence of Ukraine, the distillery became the largest enterprise in the alcohol industry in Ukraine.

In March 1995, the Verkhovna Rada included the plant in the list of enterprises whose privatization is prohibited due to their state significance.

In January 2000, the Cabinet of Ministers authorized the plant to produce components for motor fuel, and in July of the same year, the state program “Ethanol” was approved, which provided for the expansion of the use of ethyl alcohol as an energy carrier; together with other state distilleries, the plant was included in the list of executors of this programs.

A few years later, the plant went bankrupt and is now one of the largest wage debtors among enterprises in the Poltava region.

The State Enterprise “Lokhvitsky Distillery Plant” was transferred to the management of the State Property Fund from the Ministry of Economic Development, Trade and Agriculture of the EMC in May 2021.

The lot includes 139 real estate objects and structures with a total area of ​​28,614.4 sq.m. The total area of ​​land plots is 19.72 hectares (five land plots with permanent use rights).

The company also has 21 units of transport and special equipment, including trucks, tractors, trailers and diesel locomotives.

All assets are located in the Mirgorod district of the Poltava region.

There are several objects on the balance sheet of the state enterprise that are not subject to privatization.

The buyer of the EMK State Enterprise “Lokhvitsky Distillery Plant” is obliged, within six months from the date of transfer of ownership, to prevent the dismissal of workers and to pay off the enterprise’s debts on wages and to the budget.

SPFU has already transferred 54 objects of the alcohol industry to private investors through auctions in the electronic trading system Prozorro.Sales.
Most of the enterprises were sold in the Ternopil region (14 for the amount of UAH 921 million), as well as in the Lviv (nine for almost UAH 650 million) and Vinnytsia regions (10 for UAH 409 million). The average sale price of one property was UAH 56 million. The most expensive lot was the property of the Kosar distillery in the Cherkasy region. The asset was purchased for UAH 162 million.

In September 2023, the State Property Fund put up for sale the Zarubinsky distillery in the Ternopil region with a starting price of UAH 254.4 million. This made the enterprise the most expensive lot in the entire history of small-scale privatization. The auction was canceled: there were no people willing to buy the plant.

The State Property Fund plans to complete the denationalization of the alcohol industry during 2024. On March 20, he held a successful auction for the privatization of the Kholminsky distillery in the Chernihiv region. On March 22, the State Property Fund found a buyer for a former distillery near Cherkasy.