South Korean company Caris, a manufacturer of plastic road guardrails and other road safety infrastructure, has announced plans to build a plant in Ukraine that will produce environmentally friendly guardrails made of recycled plastic.
This was reported by the Ukrainian Economy Ministry after a meeting was held between Deputy Minister Iryna Novikova and the President of Caris Co., Ltd. Yu Cheol on June 11.
Caris plans to invest $60 million in the project while creating new jobs in Ukraine, according to Novikova. She hopes that it will receive state support introduced in February to attract large-scale investments to the country with tax and customs incentives.
On Feb. 10, President Volodymyr Zelensky signed the law “On State Support of Investment Projects with Significant Investments in Ukraine,” also known as the “investment nanny law,” which aims to attract investment and create comfortable conditions for doing business in Ukraine.
Novikova said the interest in the new investor-friendly mechanism is only growing and the meeting held today proves that the government is moving in the right direction to attract more investments.
In addition to attracting new investments to the country, building additional guardrails along roads is crucial to improving road safety in Ukraine. Guardrails along roads and highways can significantly slow down a car that’s gone off the road.
According to Ukraine’s police department in 2020, 168,107 road accidents were registered, of which 26,140 were either fatal or caused serious injury and 3,541 people died.
At 84 deaths per million inhabitants that puts Ukraine in second place for road deaths in Europe, just behind Romania at 85 deaths per million, according to the EU Commission on Mobility and Transport statistics. The EU average is 42 deaths per million inhabitants.
Security is a big focus of President Zelensky’s Big Construction program. “Everything – from the guardrail to the pedestrian crossing – are components of road safety,” said the head of the Department of Operation and Traffic Safety of Ukravtodor Oleg Fedorenko.
Caris has developed a guardrail that it says is both cost-efficient and environmentally friendly. Their guardrails are made from recycled plastic waste and have a shock absorption structure that provides better impact absorption that minimizes risk and damage to vehicles and passengers.
The company also been working on other projects to improve road infrastructure in Ukraine.
In July 2020, Caris signed an agreement with Yuzhmash, a Ukrainian state-owned aerospace manufacturer, to assemble 5,000 electric buses and 7,800 charging stations. The production will be continued until 2023 and the contract is worth hr 23 billion (about $852 million).
The South Korean Caris Corporation operates in 11 countries in the world, including Ukraine. Caris Ukraine was established in 2019 with an authorized capital of hr 21 million (about $778,000) before it began its investment in the country the following year.
