page_title: Dmytro Firtash
section_title: Business development initiatives
hierarchical_section_title: Dmytro Firtash / Business development initiatives
caption_attribution_description: English: Dmytro Firtash, a Ukrainian businessman and investor, one of the wealthiest people in Ukraine.
context_page_description: Dmytro Vasylovych Firtash is a Ukrainian businessman who heads the board of directors of Group DF. U.S. federal prosecutors described Firtash in 2017 court papers as an associate of Russian organized crime. He was highly influential during the Yuschenko administration and the Yanukovych administration. As a middleman for the Russian natural gas giant Gazprom, Firtash funneled money into the campaigns of pro-Russia politicians in Ukraine.
  His many roles during the Yuschenko administration included: presidency of the Federation of Employers of Ukraine, an interest association of industrial enterprises that he chairs; chairmanship of the National Tripartite Social and Economic Council; co-chairmanship of Domestic and Foreign Investors Advisory Council under the Ministry of Education, Science, Youth and Sports of Ukraine; and membership in the Committee for Economic Reforms under the President of Ukraine.
  Firtash was arrested by Austrian authorities in March 2014. In February 2017, the Vienna Court of Appeals ordered that Firtash be extradited to the United States, to face charges that he had secured a titanium extraction permit in India through $18.5 million in bribes.
context_section_description: Firtash unified the employers' organizations of Ukraine into a single powerful association, the Federation of Employers of Ukraine (FEU), which he presided over from November 2011 to September 2016. The FEU membership includes companies and enterprises collectively generating 70 percent of Ukraine's GDP. It represents employers' interests in the economic, social and labor relations with the government and trade unions at the national level.
  In 2012, Firtash initiated the establishment of a venture investment fund, Bukovyna, aimed at supporting small enterprise. It has become Ukraine's first investment fund offering preferential lending support to small businesses in all sectors of the economy.
  In October 2013, Firtash was introduced into the state commission of cooperation with the World Trade Organization by the President of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych.
caption: Firtash united Ukrainian employers
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