The Year of Lobbying in Ukraine: Over 200 Entities in the NACP Registry and the First Lessons of the Reform

Exactly one year after the Law on Lobbying came into force, Ukraine is demonstrating steady results in institutionalizing a transparent dialogue between business and the state. This was stated in a comment to RBC-Ukraine by Anastasiia Yeziarska, a senior specialist at the National Agency on Corruption Prevention (NACP). According to her, the country is now among the leaders in transparency indicators in the field of lobbying, but a key challenge remains the awareness of the business community itself: far from all representatives of the commercial sector realize that their activities fall under the definition of lobbying and require registration.

Transparency Registry: Figures and Structure

The Transparency Registry — an open platform administered by the NACP — has become the central element of the lobbying market reform in Ukraine. It launched in autumn 2025, simultaneously with the entry into force of the Law on Lobbying, and within a year it has turned into a working tool: as of August 2026, more than 200 entities are registered in it — international corporations, banks, retailers, industry associations, and GR teams. Lobbying is distributed across 23 areas, the most active of which are economic policy, protection of property rights, the IT sector, transport and infrastructure, and the agricultural sector. The first to appear in the Registry were tobacco companies — both as individual entities and as members of an industry association. The NACP links this to the specific attention of the public and regulators to tobacco production and, to a lesser extent, to alcohol.

Business Awareness: 700 Companies Behind a Single Entity

A significant part of the NACP's work in the first year of the law's operation was devoted to awareness-raising activities. As Yeziarska explained, among the registered lobbyists, large associations predominate, acting as a single lobbying entity representing the interests of hundreds of companies. According to her, in the Registry this is formally one entity, but behind it stands around 700 companies. "If each company were registered separately, we would have staggering figures," the specialist noted. This means that the real scale of lobbying activity in Ukraine significantly exceeds the formal figures of the Registry, and the regulator's task is to gradually shift business from collective to individual registration, thereby increasing the level of detail and transparency.

Problems and Exceptions: What Is Slowing Down the Implementation of the Law

Despite the positive dynamics, the NACP acknowledges the existence of systemic problems. First, the law contains a number of exceptions, and, according to the regulator's assessment, the more of them there are, the harder it is to ensure the full implementation of the regulatory act. Second, in recent months a decline in the activity of registering new lobbyists has been recorded, indicating the formation of a certain "market plateau." The agency emphasizes that at this stage it is important not to allow the institution to degrade: if business stops perceiving registration as a mandatory element of legal interest protection, the reform risks becoming a formality.

Outlook: Media Campaigns and the Formation of the Lobbying Market

In response to the decline in registration activity, the NACP is preparing a series of media campaigns aimed at explaining to business the need for registration and the mechanisms for working with the Registry. The agency emphasizes that the lobbying market in Ukraine is at the formation stage: the rules have not yet become a familiar practice for most companies, and the regulator still has to build a sustainable system of control and education. Experts have previously noted that the lobbying law is called Ukraine's step toward EU standards, as it provides business with a legal mechanism for protecting interests and the state with transparent rules for dialogue with stakeholders. The success of the reform in the coming years will depend on whether it is possible to bridge the gap between the formal number of registered entities and the actual volume of lobbying activity in the country.