The memorandum on cooperation with the "Decentralisation Support in Ukraine" DESPRO Swiss-Ukrainian project was signed by Iuliia Svitlychna, head of the Kharkiv Oblast State Administration, on 17 November.

The project has been systematically supporting the decentralisation processes in Ukraine over the past 10 years. DESPRO is now focusing on providing legal assistance to amalgamated hromadas, strategic planning of their development and training. Besides, the project’s activities address issues of municipal solid waste management and provision of technical assistance to improve potable water supply in villages, small towns and in the territories of the amalgamated hromadas.

“Joining a bilateral government programme will enable the Kharkiv Oblast to have not only organisational and legal support of AHs, but also engage them in participation in grant programmes,” said Iuliia Svitlychna. “DESPRO has currently announced a pilot competition for the financing of investment projects through the placement of bonds of local loans. And I hope that our local hromadas will take part in it as well.”

Ms Svitlychna also noted that the Kharkiv Oblast State Administration is interested in being a DESPRO partner in implementing projects to improve the quality of potable water supply in the Kharkiv Oblast.

“We pay much attention to water supply and sewage system in the oblast. In the course of almost 1,5 years we have renovated 100 km of main water supply lines and 30 water intakes, that gave an opportunity to provide almost 200 thousand residents with high-quality potable water. We will be glad to join new opportunities,” – said Iuliia Svitlychna.

Oksana Garnets, head of "Decentralisation Support in Ukraine" DESPRO Swiss-Ukrainian project in Ukraine, noted: “I am very glad that cooperation between the project and the Kharkiv Oblast is finally being formalised.”

“I am very interested to work in the Kharkiv Oblast, because it is powerful. We will be able to introduce innovative issues here, because the potential of the Kharkiv Oblast differs from other regions, and it needs to be actively used,” said Oksana Garnets. “We figured that over the years we have installed water supply lines equating in length to the entire length of Ukraine’s territory from west to east. The same situation is observed regarding municipal solid waste: we have experience of an integrated approach at rayon level, and now it can be the level of AH. Thus, we are ready to provide all kinds of support. We needed to formalise relations, and we will now continue to move on in accordance with the plan we have defined for ourselves.”

Having signed the memorandum, Iuliia Svitlychna noted: “We are sure that hromadas, the Kharkiv Oblast and Ukraine as a whole will benefit from our cooperation.”

Reference. The Kharkiv Oblast hromadas are able to participate in the announced DESPRO pilot contest “Financing investment projects by means of placement of bonds of local loans". The purpose of the contest is to support local initiatives aimed at solving the problems of hromadas by attracting funds from private investors to regional infrastructure development projects. The city councils with the number of city residents not exceeding 500 thousand people may become participants of the competition. In this case, preference is given to the  cities that are not oblast centres. The deadline for projects’ submission is 22 December 2017. Information on the terms of the contest and the application form can be found here.