Ukraine’s integration into the EU’s Digital Single Market: Potential Economic Benefits
For Ukraine, integration into the EU’s DSM is a tool for deepening its economic integration into the EU’s internal market, as well as facilitating the digitalization of Ukraine in accordance with European and international standards. It involves expansion of the mutual access to online markets and digital services, as well as Ukraine’s application of the EU’s common rules, standards and procedures in the digital sphere, including those concerning registration of electronic contracts, electronic payments and settlements, distribution of digital content, copyright registration, provision of cross-border digital services, protection of consumer rights on the internet etc.
This study quantifies the potential economic benefits of Ukraine’s integration into the EU’s DSM, which includes two main channels of influence – i. e. regulatory approximation in the digital sphere between Ukraine and the EU, which will reduce regulatory restrictions on digital trade between Ukraine and the EU, and acceleration of digital transformation in Ukraine.
This report was prepared by the team of the Trade+ International Trade Research Centre at the Kyiv School of Economics in partnership with the Ukrainian Centre for European Policy at the request of the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine and with the support of the International Renaissance Foundation. The team of authors consists of Pavlo Iavorskyi, Svitlana Taran, Oleksandr Shepotylo, and Oleksii Hamaniuk. The team of the Ukrainian Centre for European Policy consists of Liubov Akulenko and Dmytro Naumenko.
We would like to express our gratitude to the experts who took part in the survey on regulatory barriers to digital trade in Ukraine – Andrii Melashchenko, Oksana Prykhodko, Viacheslav Shtanko, Mykyta Polatayko, Dmytro Batsenko, and Nadiia Kostryba. We are also very grateful to Yuliya Garyacha, Andrii Melashchenko, Iryna Kosse, Elena Besedina, Anastasiia Hrechko, and Dmytro Naumenko for their comments. We are grateful for the opportunity to contribute to the development of the Ukrainian economy and Ukraine’s integration into the European Union.