Five years ago “Nikolaev” Special (Free) Economic Zone was set up. Its strategic purpose was to attract investors, and firstly, investments into the shipbuilding capacities, which construction had not been finished, and which were condemned to a long-time preservation because of absence of finds (i.e. read: to destruction, decay and rust). As much as 26% of the Chernomorskiy’s industrial fixed assets belonged to that very category. Nonetheless, the Yard had to make regular payments for those assets to the budget.
One could say, the Chernomorskiy Yard was lucky. In 2002, a part of those “dead” assets (namely, unfinished Eastern quay with the area of 7 hectares, where many years the unfinished “Varyag” was idling) was purchased by an agrarian company, i.e. “NIBULON Ltd.” dealing with production and export of grains and oilseeds.