Economic Security of the Ukrainian Food Industry during the War: Implications for Sustainable Development

Abstract The article examines the economic security of food industry enterprises in Ukraine under ongoing wartime conditions. The food industry plays a crucial role in national economic development, food security, and contributes to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. Thus, ensuring the economic security of food industry enterprises is an important component of sustainable development. The economic security of an enterprise was defined as a comprehensive characteristic of its activity, reflecting its ability
to maintain stable functioning and effectively confront threats of various origins. The study outlined the interrelation between economic security and environmental sustainability of food industry enterprises. The research was focused on the financial component of the
economic security of food industry enterprises. The analysis of Ukrainian food industry enterprises reflected significant negative trends, such as a decline in the economic security level, insufficient levels of financial stability and cash ratio, and a decrease in profitability.
These indicators served as a dataset for a correlation and regression analysis to identify the most significant factors influencing economic security. The results reveal that the coefficient of financial self-sufficiency, profitability of economic activity, and the ratio
between receivables and payables are the main determinants of the food industry enterprises’ economic security. The key managerial measures, aimed at strengthening economic security, include the following: improvement of financial management system,
optimization of assets and capital structure, markets and activities diversification, expanding the presence of enterprises on the Internet, optimization of economic activity costs, implementation of the corporate social responsibility concept, increasing the level of
enterprises competitiveness, reduction of the operating cycle duration, implementing an effective system for customer analysis. The directions of increasing environmental efficiency were considered as inextricably linked with economic security ensuring.