ua en ru

Ukrainian government allocates over 15 billion hryvnias for purchase of drones

Ukrainian government allocates over 15 billion hryvnias for purchase of drones Photo: Denys Shmyhal, Prime Minister of Ukraine (Vitalii Nosach, RBC-Ukraine)
Author: Daryna Vialko

At a meeting on Tuesday, April 30, the Cabinet of Ministers approved a decision to allocate an additional 15.5 billion hryvnias for the purchase of drones, announced Prime Minister of Ukraine, Denys Shmyhal.

"Today, the government allocates an additional 15.5 billion hryvnias for the purchase of drones. This is an additional resource to the 43.3 billion hryvnias that we have already allocated for drones this year. The funds will go to the administration of the State Special Communications Service, which is responsible for the relevant procurement," Shmyhal announced.

According to him, the allocated funds will allow to supply 300 thousand drones to the Security and Defense Forces.

Budget spending on defense

In early March of this year, the Cabinet of Ministers already allocated 5 billion hryvnias for the purchase of drones. However, later, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy instructed the Cabinet of Ministers to establish mass production of drones in Ukraine. The first discussions about Ukraine's large-scale drone production began in December 2023.

It is also interesting that at the beginning of the year, Minister for Strategic Industries Oleksandr Kamyshin stated that Ukraine could match Russia in terms of production of kamikaze attack drones similar to Iranian Shahed-131 and Shahed-136.

Read more about how the production of drones by Ukraine will affect the course of the war against Russia in the material of RBC-Ukraine.