The price of one An-70 military transport aircraft is about $67 million. According to Lenta.ru, it has been declared by Andrey Artushenko, Director of division for arms and military hardware development and procurement of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense. According to him, the turboprop’s price is preliminary and it may be changed, because the development program of the transport aircraft has not been completed yet.

An-70 is being developed by Ukraine and Russia. Ukrainian Ministry of Defense intends to allocate $43.3 million for development of the turboprop in 2012. It has been reported earlier that Russia will contribute $85.1 million to the An-70 project by 2013, while Ukraine will allocate $60.2 million for these purposes.

According to Deputy Commander-in-Chief of the Russian air forces, Viktor Bondarev, the operational testing of An-70 may be performed this year and then the decision on the vehicle’s acquisition will be taken. The Minister of Defense of Russian Federation, Anatoly Serdukov, has stated in April 2011 that the ministry intends to acquire 60 An-70s. The Ukrainian Ministry of Defense plans to acquire three such aircraft.

Russian Ministry of Defense has acquired the first An-70, which is being assembled at Kiev-based Aviant plant, in July 2011. The contract on turboprop’s delivery has been signed in order to help Ukraine start the assembly of the second An-70. According to Serdyukov, the production of An-70 will be launched in Russia in future. Possibly, Russia will start manufacturing of An-70 in 2014.

An-70 has a maximum speed of 780 km/h and range of 7,800 km. The short-takeoff and landing transport aircraft is able to transport 300 troopers or 47 tons of cargo. An-70 will be able to takeoff from unpaved airfields with length of 600-800 meters.