ON COUNTERING ILLEGAL HARVESTING BY RAIDERS

Abstract

The article analyzes the relations between various actors in agro-industrial production during the preparation, the execution of an attack by raiders, and after the attack, designed to collect and appropriate someone else’s harvest. The article aims to identify and provide a general description of raiders’ main actions during encroachments on the crop of agricultural producers. In Ukraine, raiders encroach on successful enterprises. Due to the quality and fertility of soils and natural and climatic conditions in the agricultural sector, conscientious producers can get a high yield. It is most often attacked by raiders during harvesting, using a set of actions. The article defines the main types of such actions: the seizure of a land plot with forged documents or without them; use of physical violence; involvement in their actions of unscrupulous notaries, state registrars, corrupt judges, and officials; the conclusion of lease agreements for shares or land plots with owners who have already leased them to another bona fide tenant; forgery of court decisions remaining in the temporarily occupied territories; registration of the right to lease land plots based on forged documents; appeal to the court with a claim to the enterprise for recovery of real or allegedly existing debt. These actions do not make up an exclusive list since the raiders are continually upgrading and diversifying the ways of encroaching on the harvest. The article briefly describes both the raiders’ actions and the practices to prevent raider attacks and protection after they have been committed. The innovations of the Law of Ukraine «On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of Ukraine on Countering Raiding» dated December 5, 2019 are also presented and analyzed, in particular in terms of introducing notarization of individual transactions; coordination of the moments of state registration of ownership of a land plot, the validity of a lease agreement and the time for harvesting; coordination of information from the State Land Cadastre and the State Register of Rights to Real Estate. The need to strengthen the fight against corruption is indicated by developing proposals to increase responsibility for corruption acts by representatives of public authorities. The article points to the future search for ways to counteract the actions described in the article and other raiders’ actions during the preparation and the attack to collect and appropriate someone else's harvest and after it.