At the beginning of March, President of Ukraine Leonid Kuchma proposed returning the Law "On the Development of the Automobile Industry of Ukraine" to the parliament for reconsideration in order to amend Article 4 of this Law. In the President's proposals, in particular, it is stated: "Article 4 of the Law proposes to determine the country of origin of automobiles and motorcycles in accordance with Articles 277-279 of the Customs Code of Ukraine. However, the Customs Code determines the country of origin of goods for the purpose of applying tariff and non-tariff methods of regulating the import of goods into the customs territory of Ukraine and the export of goods from this territory. The criteria used for this are of a general nature, are intended for a wide range of goods, and therefore cannot be applied for an objective assessment of products manufactured by a specific manufacturer." According to People's Deputy of Ukraine Yaroslav Sukhyi, one of the authors of the draft law "On the Development of the Automobile Industry," the President of Ukraine proposed returning to the wording of Article 4, which determines the country of origin of automobiles, motorcycles, components and/or spare parts, in the form proposed by its drafters. The negative impact of the adopted article was that the system of stimulating the automobile industry laid down in the draft law was effectively destroyed and the influence of the law's provisions on enterprises in both this and related industries was nullified. After all, the main prerequisite for the economic growth of enterprises is a focus on the production of goods that have the status of origin from Ukraine. According to Ya. Sukhyi, the entry into force of the law with the above-mentioned correction to Article 4 would have created a risky situation for the state, where preferences are granted, while the requirements for enterprises regarding the output of products of Ukrainian origin (i.e., more than half of the added value of the product must be produced in Ukraine) are a pure declaration, since the criteria for determining origin are only of a general nature and do not have an unambiguous interpretation. "Under such conditions, the law would in no way stimulate the production of export-suitable products, would not contribute to the creation of new jobs and further modernization of enterprises aimed at deeper production (and therefore the creation of tens of thousands of new jobs), but would simply create conditions for the unjustified granting of tax preferences to enterprises," the deputy noted. He emphasized that when choosing the criteria for the Ukrainian origin of automotive products, the drafters proceeded from the fact that at the current stage of development of the real sector of the economy, the products of domestic enterprises should be positioned primarily on the markets of the CIS, in particular, Russia.