An International Monetary Fund (IMF) team visiting Ukraine on a fact-finding mission says the country's economy is showing signs of recovery but the strength and durability of the recovery depend on progress in implementing reforms.

Ron van Rooden, head of the IMF mission team that visited Kyiv from November 3 to 17, said Ukraine's economic growth rate was expected to reach 1.5 percent in 2016 and pick up to about 2.5 percent in 2017.

But he said in a statement issued on November 18 that the strength and durability of the recovery "depend crucially on the implementation of ambitious reforms to support Ukraine's transition to a full-fledged market economy."

The statement said that "decisive steps particularly need to be taken to fight corruption, which remains the most frequently mentioned obstacle to doing business in Ukraine."

It added, "tangible results in prosecuting and convicting corrupt high-level officials and recovering proceeds from corruption have yet to be achieved."

According to IMF policy, end-of-mission statements are meant to convey a team's preliminary findings after a visit to a country and do not necessarily represent the views of the IMF's executive board.