When air raid sirens sound daily in the region, a strategy easily seems like a luxury. First things first: restore electricity and water, find funds for bomb shelters, support the hospital, help businesses stay open, and provide people with basic services. It seems as though it will be possible to plan years ahead at a later date.

But for frontline regions, the “later” approach is a dangerous strategy. Once the area has been de-occupied, active hostilities have ceased, or sufficient time has become available for preparation, there will be no time left. It will be necessary to simultaneously rebuild infrastructure, bring people back, get the economy going, resolve housing issues, and work with veterans, internally displaced persons, and communities that have lived under different conditions of war for years.

Those who do not prepare solutions now risk being left with a list of problems rather than priorities, partnerships, and projects when the decisive moment arrives.

Therefore, on 8–10 September in Uzhhorod, representatives of regional development agencies from Zaporizhzhia, Mykolaiv, Kharkiv, Kherson, Chernihiv, Sumy, and Odesa regions will gather for a Summer School organised by the Swiss-Ukrainian project “Ukraine’s Cohesion and Regional Development” (UCORD), in cooperation with the European Association of Development Agencies (EURADA).

The Summer School will combine European approaches to regional development with Ukraine’s experience of operating in wartime conditions. Using practical case studies, the exchange of experiences and facilitated discussions, participants will explore how regional development agencies can contribute to strategic planning, support for small and medium-sized enterprises, attracting investment, and building a project portfolio.

Particular attention will be paid to the organisational, managerial, and financial models underpinning the work of the Regional Development Agencies. The focus will not be on mechanically replicating European practices, but rather on identifying which of these might be useful and realistic for Ukrainian regions, particularly in light of the challenges posed by the war and the specific context of frontline territories.

The programme is designed to deliver practical outcomes for each Regional Development Agency: to identify their own priorities and possible steps for the next 12 months, as well as to understand what partnerships, capacities, mentoring and technical support are lacking to achieve these. This will also help UCORD to adjust its future support more precisely to the needs of the participating agencies.

‘There are no universal solutions in regional development, and this is particularly evident for regions living under different conditions of war. Therefore, the Summer School should not merely be an exchange of experiences, but a workspace where teams can honestly compare their approaches, identify gaps, and formulate specific next steps. It is important to us that, after Uzhhorod, each agency returns not only with new contacts, but with a clearer understanding of exactly what it can strengthen over the coming year and what support it needs to do so,’ commented Maryna Bryl, UCORD Project Leader.

The Summer School will be held at a time when a new institutional framework for state regional policy is taking shape in Ukraine. In July, the Ministry for Communities, Territories and Internally Displaced Persons of Ukraine was established, headed by Vitalii Bezgin. His remit includes the formulation of state policy on regional development, and among the strategic priorities outlined by the Minister is the transition to the European Union’s cohesion policy. The very emergence of such a centre of responsibility makes the discussion on the capacity of the regions, the role of the Regional Development Agency and fair approaches to supporting frontline territories particularly timely.

The main shortage is not just money, but the ability to make choices

For frontline regions, the list of needs will always be longer than the available resources. Water, housing, roads, schools, hospitals, bomb shelters, energy, support for small businesses, demining, transport. Every need is real. Every need is a top priority for some people.

The main question in regional policy is not “which facility to restore”, but “which decision will change the situation for the greatest number of people and secure a future for the region”.

This is a fundamentally different way of thinking. It means assessing not only the cost of construction, but also who will use the facility, how it will be maintained, whether jobs will be created around it, whether people will return, and whether it will withstand the next crisis. Sometimes this means that five neighbouring communities do not build five small, costly-to-maintain facilities, but instead create a single shared one.

For Zaporizhzhia region, this issue has another dimension. It is impossible to plan as if the region consisted solely of territory under Ukraine’s control. Some communities are temporarily occupied, but their future needs to be factored into regional decisions today.

Kateryna Kuchyna, Director of the Zaporizhzhia Regional Development Agency:
‘For Zaporizhzhia region, simply compiling a list of what needs to be rebuilt after de-occupation is not enough. Such a list would be endless. We need to address the more difficult questions right now: what sort of economy will the communities rely on, where will people return to, and what will provide them with jobs and an income? If we do not think this through now, once the territories are liberated, we risk rebuilding the infrastructure but failing to restore normal life.’

Cohesion policy: Fair rules for development

European cohesion policy is often perceived as a matter of funds, programmes, and complex procedures. In reality, it addresses a very down-to-earth question: how to ensure that the place where a person was born or lives does not limit their opportunities.

This policy does not mean that all regions receive the same. Its rationale is different: regions with poorer starting conditions or greater losses need tools that will enable them to avoid falling behind permanently.

For Ukraine, this is no longer a theoretical discussion about its European future. The war has created a huge gap between regions – in terms of security, human capital, access to investment, the state of infrastructure, and the capacity of local budgets. And this gap will not disappear automatically once hostilities cease.

The border Sumy region experiences this every day. The issue here is not merely how to rebuild what has been damaged. The question is how to prevent communities from gradually losing their population, businesses, skilled workers, and the ability to develop independently.

Vitalii Rastorhuiev, Director of the Sumy Region Regional Development Agency:
‘When people talk about border regions, they usually think about losses first. But it is just as important for the region to preserve what still works: businesses, skilled workers, local industries, and communities that are striving to develop despite everything. Businesses need the opportunity to plan not just a few weeks ahead, but at least a year in advance. Communities need resources not only to deal with the aftermath of attacks, but also to develop services, support employment, and prepare projects. If the state assesses border areas using the same criteria as safer regions, it fails to take into account the real price they pay every day for the war. The cohesion policy should enable such regions not to have to ask for special treatment, but to remain competitive and continue to play a full part in the development of the country.’

From individual requests to a shared path

Reducing the role of a regional development agency to simply drafting grant applications means underestimating its importance. A grant can support a specific solution. But before an application is submitted, someone has to identify a problem that is genuinely worth solving, gather data, recognise the links between the needs of several communities, find partners, and ensure that the project does not end up as an expensive structure lacking people, maintenance funds and a clear outcome.

Regional Development Agencies operate at the intersection of multiple interests. For the community, it is important to restore the service quickly. For the regional authorities, it is important to see how this decision affects the region as a whole. Business assesses risks, staffing, and logistics. Partners expect sound justification, transparent procedures, and measurable outcomes. These interests do not always align automatically. They need to be brought together into a single partnership around which a joint project can be developed and implemented.

In Kherson region, the need for such coordination has a very practical dimension.

Oleh Kulakevych, Director of the Regional Development Agency “Office of European Integration” in Kherson region:
‘For Kherson region, there is an urgent need today to continually update the needs of communities. Unfortunately, the destruction continues, communities are facing fresh shelling, the security situation is changing, and with it, the priority and nature of their needs. What was relevant yesterday may already require a completely different solution today. Therefore, we consider maintaining constant contact with communities, gathering and analysing up-to-date information, and matching real needs with the capabilities of national and international partners to be of fundamental importance. We see this as one of the key roles of the Regional Development Agency. Our task is not simply to pass on a list of needs to a partner. The community’s needs have to be analysed, transformed into a well-prepared project, and matched with the appropriate partner and resources, whilst individual projects have to fit into an overarching strategy for the region’s recovery and development. Without this systematic approach, support may remain fragmented: different partners will work in parallel, some needs will be duplicated, whilst others will remain inadequately addressed. Therefore, it is important to us that every project, whether humanitarian aid or an investment, is viewed not as a separate, well-intentioned initiative, but as part of the overall picture of the region’s development. In this context, coordination is not about control, but about efficiency. The agency should help to establish ongoing links between communities, regional authorities, the business sector, and international partners, so that limited resources are channelled where they can have the greatest impact. For the frontline Kherson region, this is particularly important: we have to respond to today’s pressing challenges whilst at the same time preparing solutions that will build economic resilience, strengthen communities and lay the foundations for the region’s long-term recovery.’

Therefore, project management skills are not the only important ones for Regional Development Agencies. Equally important are the abilities to engage in dialogue with communities, the business sector, and the expert community; to work with data; to set regional priorities; to explain complex decisions; and to maintain consistency when circumstances, partners, or sources of funding change.

In frontline regions, these functions become particularly valuable. Here, the cost of a mistake is higher, and there is less time to correct it. Decisions made today must take into account not only the scale of the destruction, but also security risks, demographic changes, the needs of displaced people, the state of the local economy, and the capacity of communities to maintain the restored infrastructure in the future.

The purpose of the Summer School in Uzhhorod

In frontline regions, there is no scope for testing solutions over a long period: a mistake in prioritisation costs money, time and, often, people’s trust. Hence, the Summer School in Uzhhorod provides a space where teams from regional development agencies can compare their approaches to tackling the most complex challenges before they turn into costly management errors.

The school participants represent regions that have experienced different consequences of the war and operate under different security and economic conditions. For them, the value of this work lies in the opportunity to compare their own experiences with those of their colleagues, to take a critical look at familiar approaches, and to understand which of the practices developed by other regions might be useful in their own contexts.

The programme provides an opportunity to engage in dialogue on a professional and substantive level: how to reconcile the immediate needs of communities with the region’s longer-term goals; how to work with the business sector, international partners, and neighbouring communities; how to explain complex decisions to the public; and how to use data correctly. Such an exchange creates more than just a network of contacts. It helps to develop a common language for regional development, without which the country’s recovery will inevitably fragment into separate, unconnected projects.

The value of the UCORD Summer School lies precisely in this: it empowers individuals and teams who, even now, have to keep their sights set not on a single project or community, but on the future of the entire region.

‘Ukraine’s recovery will only be successful if every region can propose its own development path, drawing on its people, economy, resources, and the needs of its communities. For frontline regions, this task is particularly challenging: they must simultaneously address the aftermath of the war, preserve human and entrepreneurial potential, and prepare for the return of residents and the restoration of de-occupied territories. Regional development agencies can combine these processes into a joint effort involving the authorities, communities, business, academia, and civil society, so that decisions for the region are not taken in isolation and without consideration of the long-term consequences. This is how cohesion is built: when people, regardless of where they live, have access to opportunities, services, and prospects,’ said Maryna Bryl.

The extent to which Ukraine is able to support these regions right now will determine not only the pace of their recovery, but also whether the front line will become a line of long-term inequality between regions.

The cohesion policy has to provide an answer to precisely this question: how to restore to the regions bearing the heaviest burden of the war their rightful place in the economic, social, and European future of Ukraine.