Ukraine’s Agrarian Sector in the Conditions of COVID-19 Distribution and Restrictive Quarantine Measures: Methodological Principles of Empirical Evaluation

Abstract

Conditioned upon the negative impact of pandemic restrictions explained by the spread of COVID-19 disease, the global economy is declining, which has led to real risks and threats to the development of the Ukrainian agricultural sector. Identifying these risks and threats, assessing the impact of the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic and the quarantine measures introduced in response to the agricultural sector is an important problem of agricultural policy that requires maximum efforts to solve it. The purpose of the article is to summarise the methodological basis for assessing the impact of restrictive quarantine measures 2020-2021 related to the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic for the agricultural sector of the Ukrainian economy, to substantiate the basis for determining criteria and indicators of impact and to carry out their empirical measurement. Analysis and synthesis, induction and deduction, analogy and comparison are used to generalise the theoretical and methodological aspects of the study. To diagnose the dynamics of economic indicators, economic and statistical methods are used in analytical studies. A number of techniques of abstract-logical tools made it possible to formulate intermediate and final conclusions. Methodological foundations, scientific, methodological and practical approaches to assessing the impact of restrictive quarantine measures 2020-2021 related to the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic for the agricultural sector of the Ukrainian economy have been improved by substantiating the optimal research tools, identifying the most informative indicators and indicators. It is proved that from the standpoint of an integrated approach, all indicators that are a measure of the impact of the spread of COVID-19 and restrictive quarantine measures on the development of the agricultural sector should be considered in accordance with the target segments for assessing changes at the macro and micro levels. In particular: macroeconomic trends in business efficiency; entrepreneurial activity; foreign economic activity; social and labour relations; finance and investment, state support, etc. The analysis showed that the progressive development of agriculture in Ukraine during 2020 explained by quarantine restrictions demonstrated structural, economic and financial effects (results) of a downward nature. Promising areas for further research in this direction should include the development of a set of strategic measures to minimize risks for the agricultural sector of Ukraine during and after the end of the COVID-19 pandemic