Ukrainian defence industry covers 40% of armed forces' needs – Ukraine's foreign minister

Ukraine meets 40% of its armed forces' needs thanks to its domestic defence industry and has significantly increased weapons production, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha says.

Source: Ukrainian news agency UNN

Details: During a joint press conference with Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, Sybiha said that Ukraine already has significant achievements and is a global leader in drone technologies.

Quote from Sybiha: "In certain areas, we have increased our production manifold. In some cases, we have scaled the production of military equipment and weapons for the needs of Ukrainian troops and defence by up to 35 times.

Thanks to our defence industry, we can now produce around 40% of our forces’ needs. This is an extremely high figure. We are currently manufacturing artillery shells, including those of Western or NATO calibre, which we did not produce before the war… Some countries with significant potential are unable to produce in a year what we can produce in a month." 

Details: Sybiha emphasised that Ukraine needs additional investment for further development of the defence sector. He also highlighted the importance of reducing dependence on external suppliers of critical weapons.

Background:

• Earlier, Ukrainian Minister of Strategic Industries Herman Smetanin reported that in the previous year, one third of Ukraine’s total GDP growth was ensured by the defence industry.
• Weapons and equipment worth US$9 billion were produced in 2024 – three times more than in 2023. Smetanin said Ukraine’s GDP grew by 3.9% last year, with the defence industry contributing a third of that growth – 1.27%. He added that the defence sector had increased its capacity sevenfold.
• Previously, it was reported that in 2024, private arms manufacturers could have produced an additional 1.7 million units of drones and electronic warfare systems, but they did not receive government contracts. 
• Ukraine topped the list of the world’s largest importers of major types of weapons in the period 2020–2024. Its arms imports increased almost 100-fold compared to 2015–2019, according to a report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
• Ukraine became the only European country in the top 10 arms importers. Meanwhile, many other European countries have also significantly increased their arms purchases in recent years.

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