Restoration ministry: International partners help with reconstruction efforts in 360 communities

A total of 360 territorial communities across Ukraine have established cooperation with international partners, and the number of communities covered by donor assistance will increase by the end of 2024.

The relevant statement was made by Ukrainian Communities, Territories and Infrastructure Development Deputy Minister Oleksandra Azarkhina during the Third Recovery Forum, which is taking place in the Zhytomyr region, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

“Today, 360 communities are working with international partners. A large portion of projects were launched before the [Russian] full-scale invasion started, for example the USAID initiatives. Last year we managed to activate a number of donors who would assist communities with recovery efforts. In particular, 10 communities are under the patronage of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). The British development agency undertook to assist another 10 communities. Canada will support 19 communities. We hope that France’s patronage project in the Chernihiv region will cover another six communities,” Azarkhina told.

In her words, the above projects mainly refer to technical assistance, the exchange of expertise, preparation of planning documents that will help communities to become more competitive in further struggle for access to financing.

At the same time, the current objective of the Ukrainian Communities, Territories and Infrastructure Development is to make the distribution of donor assistance fairer.

“Some communities have got up to five donors, while some have 0 partners. Our task is to make the coverage and involvement of different projects in Ukrainian communities fairer,” Azarkhina explained.

The ministry is also planning to synchronize the existing mandatory recovery planning documents at the local level to help communities create the planning portfolios in order to attract large-scale donor investments.

“At the local level, there are 22 mandatory planning documents for communities, which cover different areas. Instead, we should transition to the development of the so-called reconstruction portfolio, i.e. synchronize, let’s say, spatial planning, direct economic development plans, budget planning, etc. We should withdraw from isolated reconstruction as we did last year to eliminate the consequences of [Russian] armed aggression, because the international organization, the international creditor is interested mainly in the portfolio proposals, large-scale projects which have better chances to obtain support,” Azarkhina noted.

A reminder that Canada is launching the Community-Led Inclusive Recovery (CLIR) initiative in Ukraine, as part of which 19 communities will receive expert assistance in sustainable, inclusive, social and economic recovery.